Independent 11,169 by Tees

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You learn something new every day and you certainly do if you tackle Tees’s puzzles.

Solving started at pace:  8A SEA WALL seemed very obvious, then 1D ASTEROID looked like a well known anagram (if it isn’t, it is now) which all surprised me because I know Tees can deliver some chewy puzzles.
That run of instant solving lasted all of two clues and I didn’t get another very quickly till 14A IDLE where the alternate-letters indicator shone out at me.  A few others dotted around the grid got solved until by the end of the first pass (all clues attempted) I had 10½ solved (I was sure of ELECTRIC at 4d but hadn’t got the rest).

The next stage took somewhat longer as I teased out what I could leaving a significant hole in the bottom right.
Then, when having another go at 13/26 I wrote out what I had so far on the perimeter from the top left

ANYEHAR   M….   …HATY   EWILL

and spotted “Ye Harm” and “Ye Will”.  Now, this sparked an old memory from when I read about Aleister Crowley as a teenager, and thinking about occult stuff allowed me to get part of the answer to 13/26 from the wordplay as WICCAN.  I then turned to Wikipedia and could to fill in the rest when I found The Wiccan Rede (wikipedia link):

AN YE HARM NONE DO WHAT YE WILL

With the final perimeter letters the last few clues were solved without too much more hassle.
I did check a few answers to be sure: 16 The ancient name for the city of Acre, and 28 The Hindu text

Across
8 SEA WALL Main restriction almost absent in trade (3,4)
AWA[y] in SELL.  First read and answered.
9 ANNIE Orphaned character pawning item here and there (5)
Alternate letters in pAwNiNg ItEm
10 LEVI Patriarch against wearing Hawaiian garland (4)
V (against) in LEI (Hawaiian garland)
11 ALCOHOLISM In which one’s local confused with home endlessly? (10)
(I’S LOCAL HOM[e])* AInd: confused.   With the whole clue functioning as the definition, so semi &Lit I guess
12 LONGHAIR Hippie look no good with hard expression (8)
LO (look) N[o] G[ood] H[ard] AIR (expression)
13/26 WICCAN REDE With John Adair say inspired by cool principle used around here? (6,4)
W[ith] CAN (John) RED (Adair, say) inside (inspired by) ICE (cool)
The perimeter states the Wiccan Rede
14 IDLE Regularly find clues not working (4)
Alternate letters in fInD cLuEs
16 ACCHO Caught twice breaking into a house in Acre once (5)
C[aught] C[aught] inside A HO
The former name for the town of Acre in Palestine / the Levant
18 NO GO Drink nothing? Impossible! (2,2)
NOG (drink) O
20 WEBCAM Zoom lens? (6)
Cryptic Def. referring to Zoom software.
23 ALEUTIAN Beer served with tuna one ordered in these islands? (8)
ALE (beer) (I TUNA)* AInd: ordered.
Last answer entered.
25 EISTEDDFOD Arts festival: see it anew, following round in 3D? (10)
(SEE IT)* AInd: anew, then F[ollowing] O (round) inside DDD (3D)
The wordplay really helped get the spelling right
27 LINKS Start to license tattoos for associates (5)
L[icense] INKS (tattoos)
28 SHASTRA Letters from Kish as transcribed for sacred writing (7)
Hidden in kiSH AS TRAnscribed
Down
1 ASTEROID Radio set destroyed in sun orbiter (8)
(RADIO SET)* AInd: destroyed.
2 NAMING Allotting term to an overthrown imperial dynasty (6)
AN< (an, overthrown) MING (imperial dynasty)
3 YADA YADA 24 hours doubled up and so on? (4,4)
A DAY (24 hours) twice, all reversed
4 ELECTRIC CATFISH Stunning swimmer‘s thrilling fact needing correction somewhat? (8,7)
ELECTRIC (thrilling) (FACT)*  AInd: need correction.  -ISH (somewhat)
I had heard of a few electric sea creatures but never met an Electric Catfish (see this link)
5 HAW-HAW Two red berries for William Joyce? (3-3)
HAW (a red berry) twice.
It certainly helped knowing who William Joyce was (see this link)
6 ANGLICAN Old English walls cold in one church (8)
C[old] inside ANGLIAN (Old English)
7 RED SEA Waters that had a big part in Exodus? (3,3)
Cryptic Def. referencing Moses’s “party” trick
15 EXCITANT Able to stimulate old worker around City dumping yen (8)
EX ANT (old worker) around CIT[y]
17 OVERDRAW How to obtain funds unduly from extra lottery? (8)
OVER (extra) DRAW (lottery)
19 GRANDDAD Superb commercial inspiring daughter’s older relative (8)
D[aughter] inside GRAND AD (inspiring commercial)
21 EVILLY Unfinished base in Fenland city in a bad way? (6)
VIL[e] (base) in ELY (Fenland city)
22 MEDUSA Jellyfish in sea to America’s north? (6)
MED (sea, Mediterranean) above (to the north of) USA (America)
24 TURN TO Set about Pole tucking into rotten trout (4,2)
N[orth] inside (TROUT)* AInd: rotten.

 

14 comments on “Independent 11,169 by Tees”

  1. One error. EXCITING where EXCITANT is required. Stupid. Googled a few – Acre’s former name and which fish is electric, plus the jellyfish, and I guessed 13/26 from the crossers. Likes for SEAWALL, WEBCAM, NAMING, MEDUSA and ALCOHOLISM. I’ve seen ONE’S for IS elsewhere just recently and ‘lo’ for look. My cruciverbal lexis is expanding. Took a while, like this grid. Thanks Tees. Couldn’t parse ANGLICAN. ‘Walls’ is a verb! Thanks BM.

  2. rookie@1
    EXCITANT is the correct answer. No error.

    The clue for WICCAN REDE took me round and round, but I got there eventually. Very nice clueing.
    ELECTRIC CATFISH: Equally exciting. Watched Absurd Planet recently. No creature shocks me.
    SHASTRA: deep meanings hidden in the ancient texts, some say. Symbolically clued!!!
    RED SEA: bm’s ‘party trick’ comment 🙂

  5. 7d reminds me of the Bestie cartoon with Moses saying “What do you mean it’s a bit muddy?”.

  6. Defeated by the linked WICCAN REDE and Nina. I take my hat off to beermagnet for spotting anything in the apparent gobbledegook running around the perimeter and, whilst I hazarded a guess at WICCAN, I had no idea about the REDE. I’m afraid I also revealed the ELECTRIC element of the fish – and kicked myself afterwards: I’d got CATFISH and, swimming things not being a strong point, assumed it would be something obscure (though I did know there were things swimming in the depths with lights attached). Once I’d revealed, the thrilling=ELECTRIC jumped out.

    Favourites today: LONGHAIR, NO GO, WEBCAM, ALEUTIAN, HAW-HAW, OVERDRAW, GRANDDAD and MEDUSA.

    Thanks Tees and beermagnet

  7. The Nina almost led me astray – I had an–h-r in the top row and assumed it would be “another”. 8a then showed me I was wrong. Thanks to beermagnet and Tees for the entertaining and informative start to the day.

  8. I too was defeated by the WICCAN REDE and never saw the Nina!

    Thanks to Tees for the brain stretching and to beermagnet for sorting it all out

  9. Nice, and nicer still perhaps for a Saturday. Magic, even, with the Nina holding onto its secrets for a while. Some really awkward words clued well, so lots of fun and frolics for me.

    For ALCOHOLISM I think it’s probably I’S contained in the anagram btw.

  11. Eventually managed to get the mysterious WICCAN REDE and saw the Nina, but didn’t know what either meant and couldn’t link them despite the ‘used around here?’ in the clue. A few other new ones (ACCHO and SHASTRA) for which I relied on wordplay and I was grateful for the crossers to help spell EISTEDDFOD.

    Very original- a cryptic that was occult as well. I wonder what Tees has in store for his next weekend offering.

    Thanks to Tees and beermagnet

  12. WordPlodder: You got me wondering what kind of “offering” you meant.
    So I consulted a list of pagan festivals. Looks like there are some fun ones coming up – basically what we would think of as Harvest Festivals.

  13. Thanks both. Like a few here, I got parts of the linked answer and Nina but had no knowledge of either, notwithstanding I feel Wicca has come up at least twice recently in the Indy. I guessed ACCHO from the wordplay, but page 1 on Google would not confirm, which for me puts it in the distinctly obscure category. At least the barely-cryptic RED SEA was in my clearly limited bounds of knowledge

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