A Crux crossword was what I expected, a Crux crossword was what I got.
All fairly typical for this setter, a good start of the week.
Less typical was that I failed to complete the puzzle, missing out on one clue and not being able to fully understand another (and one more as it turned out to be).
Therefore any help (for 18ac and 4d) would be much appreciated!
Definitions are underlined wherever possible and/or appropriate.
| Across | ||
| 1 | MATTHEW | Saintly name taken by groom at the wedding (7) |
| Hidden answer [taken by]: groom at the wedding | ||
| 5 | TADPOLE | A little European, seen as future prince in fairy tale (7) |
| TAD (a little) + POLE (European) | ||
| 9 | SERGE | Soldier perhaps leaves NCO some material (5) |
| SERGEANT (NCO) minus ANT (soldier, famous from crosswords) | ||
| 10 | TAE KWON DO | Weak do not train for this Olympic event (3,4,2) |
| Anagram [train] of WEAK DO NOT | ||
| 11 | TROUSERED | Pocketed money (undeserved) – sure to upset a socialist (9) |
| Anagram [upset] of SURE TO, followed by RED (a socialist) | ||
| 12 | NORSE | Old Scandinavian doctor wants only half of course (5) |
| NO (Doctor, of James Bond fame) + [cou]RSE False decapitalisation, I’m afraid. |
||
| 13 | NERVE | Sauce bottle (5) |
| Double definition | ||
| 15 | ACTRESSES | Starlets in Hair start with a big number (9) |
| TRESSES (hair), preceded by A C (big number, 100) False capitalisation, that’s all right. |
||
| 18 | DIPSWITCH | Uses ducking stool? This could lower the beam (9) |
DIPS WITCH (uses ducking stool as an early form of waterboarding?) [with thanks to peterj @1] |
||
| 19 | STRAP | Reverse roles as a form of punishment (5) |
| Reversal [reverse] of PARTS (roles) | ||
| 21 | OLDER | Senior shows more daring sacrificing bishop (5) |
| BOLDER (more daring) minus B (bishop) | ||
| 23 | UP THE WALL | Where climbers may go mad (2,3,4) |
| Double definition | ||
| 25 | DALAI LAMA | Young man returns (with first-class City degree) to be religious leader (5,4) |
| Reversal [returns] of LAD (young man), followed by AI (first-class, A1) + LA (city) + MA (degree) | ||
| 26 | RULER | The measure of a king (5) |
| Double definition | ||
| 27 | EXTENTS | Areas where No 10 (twice!) gets caught with wrong set (7) |
| X (ten) + TEN, together inside an anagram [wrong] of SET | ||
| 28 | SPRITES | Special ceremonies of goblins,elves and imps (7) |
| SP (special) + RITES (ceremonies) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | MESS TIN | A dog’s dinner can be what Tommy has for his meal! (4,3) |
| MESS (a dog’s dinner) + TIN (can) In this clue Tommy refers to a private soldier. |
||
| 2 | TURBOPROP | Tailless flatfish needs support like some jet aircraft (9) |
| TURBO[t] (flatfish, without the last letter) + PROP (support) | ||
| 3 | HEELS | He is briefly in possession of the Spanish lists (5) |
| HE’S (he is, briefly) around EL (the, in Spanish) | ||
| 4 | WATERCART | A layer of dust (9) |
| This one eludes me – help! ‘Watercart’ [although, two words or hyphenated] seems to be the only word that fits but that doesn’t make sense to me. Comments 3 and 4 (especially the latter) make clear what Crux probably meant – let’s call it a Cryptic definition. |
||
| 5 | TREND | Fashion starts to turn ridiculous on purpose (5) |
| Starting letters of: Turn Ridiculous, followed by END (purpose) | ||
| 6 | DO WONDERS | Parties without doubt work miracles (2,7) |
| DOS (parties, plural of ‘do’) around WONDER (doubt, as a verb) | ||
| 7 | OWNER | One who has depression takes day off (5) |
| DOWNER (depression) minus D (day) | ||
| 8 | ELOPERS | A dish and spoon in nursery rhyme, say (7) |
| Cryptic definition Not so very cryptic though if you’re familiar with this nursery rhyme. |
||
| 14 | EDWARDIAN | Two-man contribution to a bygone age – the noughties? (9) |
| EDWARD (man #1) + IAN (man #2) Not sure whether the part of speech is right here. |
||
| 16 | TAHITIANS | A saint worried about success for an island people (9) |
| Anagram [worried] of A SAINT, going around HIT The inclusion of ‘an’ must be a typo, I guess. psmith, below, doesn’t think so but I’m afraid that ‘an island people’ sounds a bit odd to me – but then, true, English isn’t my first language. |
||
| 17 | STREAMLET | Alter stem to create smaller flower (9) |
| Anagram [to create] of ALTER STEM | ||
| 18 | DO OR DIE | “Exit, exit!” Light Brigade’s fatal order, effectively (2,2,3) |
| DOOR (exit, as a noun) + DIE (exit, as a verb) | ||
| 20 | POLARIS | Kind of bear is seen only after dark (7) |
Polaris is the pole star, the brightest star in Ursa Minor (i.e. Little Bear). |
||
| 22 | DELFT | Newspaper to follow central guideline in China (5) |
| FT (newspaper) coming after [gui]DEL[ine] China as in ceramic material. |
||
| 23 | URALS | Old city atlas oddly depicting these mountains (5) |
| UR (old city) + the odd letters of ATLAS | ||
| 24 | ERROR | Dread getting guillotined by mistake (5) |
| TERROR (dread) minus the first letter T | ||
*anagram
18a “dips witch”=”use ducking stool”=switch fro dip to full beam headlights
I failed on 4dn – a mistake perhaps?
thanks
No problem with dips witch. Tried several word fits on 4d but could only find water cart, which seems to be two words, at least in my Collins.
I think a water cart (two words) is something that used to spay water on a road or other surface to stop dust rising up and causing problems for motorists. Anyone else remember the days when the dipswitch on a car was a button on the floor by the clutch pedal or is that just me showing my age?
Thanks to Crux and SIl
A childhood book from the 50’s had cartoon personifications of unusual vehicles. One was ‘I’m Willy the Watercart. Work hard I must, to sprinkle the water that lays down the dust…’. 60 years ago. Blimey. And yes, Sue, my first car had such a dipswitch, right next to the little foot pump for the screen wash. And, yes, again, we’re both showing our age.
Thanks to Crux and Sil. I too failed on WATERCART and in the US a DIPSWITCH is a dimmer. Also, this sense of TROUSERED was new to me though I did parse it An enjoyable beginning to the week.
Funny,I got “dipswitch” from the surface and then found out that it’s the British term for (headlight) dimmer switch.
Thanks Crux & Sil.
In 16 down I think that the “an” is not a typo. Tahitians are people of AN island (Tahiti).
I parsed 20 down as POLAR (a kind of bear) IS (is).
Thanks Crux and Sil
Pretty straightforward in places but with some real sting (or depth anyway) in the tail in others. Was able to correctly fill in the grid but there was some work to do in fully understanding the parsing of quite a few of them.
Am of the age group that recalls the DIPSWITCH on the floor of my first Holden car – took a while to get the WITCH part of the clue though, until I looked up the wiki entry for ‘ducking stool’. I parsed POLARIS the same as psmith@7.
WATERCART was my last one in and eventually found a similar definition to Grant@4’s “Willy” !
A nice start to the week.
Yes, that’s it, psmith (20d).
Another one that should be corrected … done.