Independent 9796 / Eccles

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By some freak circumstance, we’ve had the pleasure of blogging Eccles’ last three puzzles. This one was up there with the others – all good fun – we particularly liked 26ac.

 

Hoskins’ puzzle on Sunday had ‘police’ as an anagrind and AIOLI as one of the entries. What a strange coincidence especially after Simon S mentioned that he hadn’t seen POLICE as an anagrind before – neither had we.

We had one minor quibble from us during the solve – the use of ‘s’ as an abbreviation for ‘see’ in 25ac. We couldn’t find a reference to this initially in Chambers which we have on our iPads but Collins online has it as an abbreviation.

Across
1   Stems from fundamental Christians twice ignoring extreme elements (8)
ANGELICA evANGELICAls (fundamental Christians) without or ‘ignoring’ the outer pairs (‘twice’) of letters or ‘extreme elements’
5   Minor finally clothed in fountain in Brussels? (6)
SPROUT R (last or ‘final’ letter of ‘minor’) in SPOUT (fountain)
9   Pressure fool’s wife or daughter to provide access code (8)
PASSWORD P (pressure) ASS (fool) W (wife) OR D (daughter)
10   Bill Gates’ Centre cracks problem (6)
POSTER T (middle or ‘centre’ letter of ‘Gates’) in or ‘cracking’ POSER (problem)
12   Dip in sea, at last, before 10.51 (5)
AIOLI A (‘last’ letter of ‘sea’) IO (ten) LI (fifty-one in Roman numerals)
13   Remove hedge at the end of loveless marriage (9)
UNINSTALL STALL (hedge) after UNIoN (marriage) without the ‘o’ or ‘loveless’)
14   Tycoon in Hindu’s trial is tainted (13)
INDUSTRIALIST Hidden in hINDU’S TRIAL IS Tainted
17   Make excessively emotional movie star read broadcast (13)
OVERDRAMATISE An anagram of MOVIE STAR READ – anagrind is ‘broadcast’
19   Account of persistent case of lice (9)
CHRONICLE CHRONIC (persistent) + LicE (first and last letters or ‘case’)
21   Ampere is the French word meaning passageway (5)
AISLE A (ampere) IS LE (French for ‘the’)
23   Responsibility each Argentinian carries (6)
CHARGE Hidden in or ‘carried by’ eaCH ARGEntinian
24   One involved in diplomacy to make money, it’s rumoured, is reticent (8)
TACITURN I (one) ‘involved’ in TACT (diplomacy) + a homophone (‘it’s rumoured’) of EARN (make money)
25   See ex-Prime Minister in figure-hugging dress (6)
SHEATH S (see) HEATH (Ted Heath, ex-Prime Minister)
26   Most feeble exam score of zero? (8)
FAINTEST FA (….’score of zero’) IN TEST (exam)
Down
1   Alarm about European request (6)
APPEAL APPAL (alarm) round E (European)
2   Vigorous enjoyment in ring after bit of wind (5)
GUSTO O (ring) after GUST (bit of wind)
3   Vulgar men do wild acts (3-6)
LOW-MINDED An anagram of MEN DO WILD – anagrind is ‘acts’
4   State police can cut crimes (12)
CIRCUMSTANCE An anagram of CAN CUT CRIMES – anagrind is ‘police’
6   Devout Liberal has company ejected (5)
PIOUS coPIOUS (liberal) without or ‘ejecting’ ‘co’ (company)
7   Boycott bears up after duck, and is tolerable, in the end (9)
OSTRACISE CARTS (bears) reversed or ‘up’ after O (duck) + IS E (last letter or ‘end’ of ‘tolerable’)
8   Filled cases of tequila, primarily, with skill to get permits (8)
TARTLETS T (first or ‘primary’ letter of ‘tequila’) ART (skill) LETS (permits)
11   Foreign invaders are taking over area in mountain range (6,6)
SIERRA NEVADA An anagram of INVADERS ARE (anagrind is ‘foreign’) round or ‘tasking over’ A (area)
14   Get drunk at home and eat Brie that’s gone off (9)
INEBRIATE IN (at home) + an anagram of EAT BRIE – anagrind is ‘gone off’
15   Excitement as I’m entering American state (9)
ANIMATION I’M ‘entering’ A (American) NATION (state)
16   Clown court’s harbouring new plots (8)
CONCOCTS COCO (clown) CTS (courts) round or ‘harbouring’ N (new)
18   Exercise freak swallows a legume (6)
PEANUT PE (exercise) NUT (freak) round or ‘swallowing’ A
20   Terrible thing, darkness (5)
NIGHT An anagram of THING – anagrind is ‘terrible’
22   Relish pertness (5)
SAUCE Double definition

 

16 comments on “Independent 9796 / Eccles”

  1. Lovely puzzle from Eccles for a new solver – much of it went in quickly, which is a rare and enjoyable circumstance. One question – on 8, I was perplexed by the inclusion of “to get” in the clue. I see how it vastly improves the surface, but I can’t recall (in my limited solving experience) that much extra verbiage with no function in the clue. Many thanks to both Eccles and B&J!

  3. Welcome to fifteensquared Oren.

    We think you are correct that each word should have a function but were quite happy with 8d. Both ‘with’ and ‘to get’ seem to be performing the same function in the parsing indicating that you are adding each section to the last one to arrive at the solution.

  4. Also loved 26a. The anagram at 17a was pretty good too. Like BJ I queried S for ‘See’ and looked in vain at Chambers first. Then looked in my Collins where it was first in the list. Thanks to Eccles and BJ.

  5. Thanks b&j and eccles. A nice quick solve but didn’t get why s was see. Is it see as in bishop?

  7. Lots to like about this, with some quite hard ones, including the interesting ‘Stems’ def for ANGELICA and the longish anagrams holding me up.

    I’m another one to give FAINTEST a big tick and as a cricket fan, I loved the surface for 7d, even if it probably has little relationship to what happened in real life!

    Thanks to Eccles and B&J.

  8. I started this at a gallop and had most of the LHS completed with a couple of gaps in short order. Then I ground to a halt and had to extract answers like teeth. Painfully slowly. Eventually I ground my way to a finish, but didn’t get a completion notice. I soon spotted I’d typed an N instead of an M in 4d. ANGELICA was my LOI. I liked 26a too. SPROUT made me chuckle. Just over half an hour to get to the end. Thanks Eccles and B&J.

  9. Flashling @5, this isn’t the first time I’ve wondered about why ‘see’ is in Collins, but not in Oxford (at least online) and Chambers. In Collins online, it’s repeated in the US section as well, yet doesn’t appear in the online Merriam-Webster dictionary. I haven’t seen it any list of ecclesiastical list of abbreviations either.

  10. Thanks Eccles, great stuff again.

    Interesting that inebriate(d) also appears in today’s ft by Julian/Baerchen/Knut. Clued completely differently, of course.

    Loads to like here, I really enjoyed AIOLI, POSTER and OVERDRAMATISE, plenty more that was fun.

    Thanks B&J

  11. Great puzzle Eccles – been a while since I solved one of yours.  26a is brilliant, and 14 the longest hidden word I’ve seen.  Thanks, and to bloggers for parsing 4d; was looking for a container.

  12. Great stuff, loads of good ones.  FAINTEST, AISLE for its silliness, OVERDRAMATISE and CIRCUMSTANCE (brilliant, once you’re on board with police) UNINSTALL, CHRONICLE.  Also, since nobody’s yet pointed it out, this is what SPROUT is about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manneken_Pis

    Thanks Eccles, Bert&Joyce

  13. All fairly straightforward, apart from 8dn where one of us was convinced the definition had to be ‘permits’ so had to resort to a wordfinder, and a real facepalm moment when we saw the answer.

    We did get the allusion in the surface of 5ac, having visited the said fountain.

    Too many brilliant clues to nominate a CoD.

    Thanks, Eccles and B&J.

     

     

  14. Very late in today but had to see how B&J handled the decryption of 26a – well done indeed to both of you!   Needless to say, that was my favourite today.

    Got the 1a ‘stems’ long before being able to work out the correct parsing, rather a clever clue.

    Thanks to Eccles and to B&J for the blog.

  15. Thanks to B&J for the blog – I hope you don’t get sick of me, I do enjoy reading your blogs – and thanks to all who commented.  Oren, nice to read your comment – I try to make the puzzles accessible to new solvers (but still providing some entertainment to those who can solve them in a few minutes), so I managed at least a little bit of this.  As for police, I did read Sunday’s blog and notice Harry had used it.  I remember him (I think) using it before, perhaps about a year ago, and people discussed it then, and generally found in favour.  I’d written this clue then, but not used it, so was pleased to see it was legit.

    I have always assumed that S=see as in diocese, but don’t know the context.

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