A themed double alphabetical jigsaw with the added complication of an error in the enumeration meant that this Bank Holiday Special presented a tougher than expected challenge. The special instructions indicated that one of each pair was of a kind, not further defined.
My normal method for solving alphabeticals is to go through the clues and cold solve as many as I can, paying particular attention to those where the enumeration means that it may be possible to locate a particular letter with some degree of certainty. Then I proceed by way of trial and error. My usual solving partner, Timon, adopts a more scientific method, and calculates exactly how many words of each length there are, cross-referencing them to their initial letters. Had I adopted his approach, I might have spotted the problem rather sooner than I did. This particular grid offered only three squares which commenced both an across and a down solution. One of those, in the middle of the grid, was for words of 12 and 6 letters, so had to be Q, since no other letter had two words with that particular combination. A little below that was another such square with words of 7 and 9 letters, so that had to be N. I soon realised that there must be a mistake, as NEW MOON clashed with both the 11 letter solutions (it had to cross an 11 letter word, and I had already solved both of them). On closer examination, the grid had four spaces for 9 letter words, but only three nine letter answers, according to the enumeration. There was a similar discrepancy with the 7 letter answers and a corresponding one with the 8 letter ones.
The enumeration error related to the letter B, where the correct figures were indeed 7 and 9, rather than 8 and 8 as published. This meant that it was the letter B that could be fixed in the square where I had put the N, and once I had solved BROTEAS, I was able to place both DIEGO RIVERA and ACCLIMATISE. I was also able to place the L and soon able to make educated guesses as to where to place my completed solutions. At first, with QUETZALCOATL, XIPE and DIEGO RIVERA among my earliest solves, I suspected a Mexican theme, but it transpired that the themed words all alluded to gods or other mythical characters, mostly from ancient Greece.
I have added links in the blog to the more obscure mythical characters; I had to rely on Wikipedia extensively to confirm my guesses. I have underlined the definition for the non-themed answer in each case. There are a couple of clues where I have been unable to parse the wordplay wholly to my satisfaction, but no doubt someone will point out my omissions and errors. My compliments to Maskarade for compiling such an intricate and complex puzzle, which was a pleasure to solve.
I did point out the enumeration error (which Gaufrid had correctly identified in a post on last week’s prize puzzle) to the Guardian’s crossword editor, and he got back to me pretty swiftly (on a Sunday) with an acknowledgment of the error and a promise to put it right.
| Across | ||
| Down | ||
| A | ACCLIMATISE/ACIS | To adapt to new conditions, a mountaineer reportedly prepared site of some classical revolutionary (11; 4) |
| Homophone of “a climber”, *SITE. Hidden and reversed in “classical”. ACIS is a character from Greek myth. |
||
| B | BROTEAS/BIRDCALLS | Pop duo swallowing drink, as girlfriend turns up — Boom! Boom! (8; 8) |
| TEA in BROS; BROTEAS is another character from Greek myth. A charade of BIRD (girlfriend) and CALLS (turns up). So far as I know, the only British bird to boom is the bittern. |
||
| C | CLYTEMNESTRA/CELADON | Cretan-style mosaic initially re-designed for fancy decal applied to glazed pottery (12; 7) |
| *(CRETAN STYLE M). CLYTEMNESTRA is yet another character from Greek myth. *DECAL, ON. It’s a pale-green glaze. |
||
| D | DIEGO RIVERA/DANAE | Artist could be reinvigorated with books and edited anthologies and essays for starters (5,6; 5) |
| *(DIEGO RIVERA +NT) = REINVIGORATED. *AND, A(nthologies) E(ssays). DANAË is a further name from ancient Greek mythology. |
||
| E | ETAERIOS/ERATO | Rosie ate rotten fruit, shedding tear with love (8; 5) |
| *(ROSIE ATE). Chambers defines an etaerio as an aggregated fruit (such as a blackberry?). *(TEAR + 0). ERATO is one of the Muses, and is often to be found in crosswords. |
||
| F | FREEMEN/FLORA | Lavish pieces for franchise holders from choice of neighbouring countries (7; 5) |
| A charade of FREE (lavish) and MEN (as in chessmen); the definition is nicely misleading and refers to the fact that the right to vote is known as the franchise. F L or A (France, Luxembourg or Austria – from the international vehicle registration codes). FLORA for a change is a Roman goddess. |
||
| G | GAEA/GUAN | New Age leading activist removed Guardian’s centrepieces for noisy bird (4; 4) |
| *AGE + A. GAEA (more usual spelling is Gaia) takes us back to Greek mythology. GU(ardi)AN is a South American game bird. |
||
| H | HERA/HAZARD | Audience member suggested it’s tough covering unknown area — something drivers should avoid (4; 6) |
| Sounds like “hearer”; HERA is another Greek goddess. Z (unknown) A(rea) in HARD. |
||
| I | INCH/IRENE | Advance slowly and steal quietly away from seductive woman topless on edge of Rhine (4; 5) |
| (P)INCH. (S)IREN, (RHIN)E. The only mythical Irene I can find is Eirene. |
||
| J | JUNO/JMBARRIE | Jack’s car for author backing British Medical Journal — a posh one, that is (4; 1,1,6) |
| J UNO. JUNO is the Roman version of Hera. BMJ (reversed) A R(olls)R(oyce) I.E. to give the children’s author, J M BARRIE. |
||
| K | KILT/KAMA | Dress material for a specific purpose left for spirit of a dead person, half-constructed (4; 4) |
| I think the wordplay is L in KIT (material for a specific purpose) but I can’t see an inclusion indicator. KA(spirit) MA(de) gives KAMA, who is an Indian god of love. |
||
| L | LOON/LYCOMEDES | Diver is an eccentric fellow, only half there, before pantomimes one cancelled (4; 9) |
| Double definition: a Canadian diving bird and an eccentric. (ON)LY COMED(I)ES. Lycomedes takes us back to Greece. |
||
| M | MAIGRE/MINYAS | Food fit to eat on fast-days that is involved with many (6; 6) |
| This is just a simple definition with no cryptic element that I can see. *(IS MANY). MINYAS is yet another reference to Greek mythology. |
||
| N | NEW MOON/NARCISSUS | Wild women working at crescent destroyed cairns — fishy! (3,4; 9) |
| *WOMEN, ON. *CAIRNS, SUS(picious). NARCISSUS, like Broteas, was a hunter from Greek myth (but probably better known). |
||
| O | ONE GALLON/ORCUS | Amount of water aboard sailing vessel, with ensign at first moved to its bow, off course endlessly (3,6; 5) |
| ON GALL(E)ON, with the E moved to the bow, or front, of the word. *COURS(E). ORCUS, I am delighted to report, was a Roman god. |
||
| P | POETICAL/POMONA | Imaginative novelist with money for little dog close to centre stage (8; 6) |
| POE, TICAL (an obsolete Siamese coin). POM(little Pomeranian) ON (st)A(ge). POMONA was another Roman goddess. |
||
| Q | QUETZALCOATL/QUIRES | Short question, perplexing to all Aztec singers, heard by several papers (12; 6) |
| QU(estion) *(TO ALL AZTEC). An Aztec god.
QUIRES sounds like choirs. |
||
| R | RAFFIA/RHEA | The French left parasitic plant for use in basketry regularly returning from lake shore (6; 4) |
| RAFF(LES)IA is the parasitic plant. Hidden and reversed alternating letters in “lake shore’. Rhea is another Greek goddess. |
||
| S | SA SA/SELENE | Fencer’s exclamation during duels — as always — unruffled when changing sides (2,2; 6) |
| Hidden in “duels as always”. SERENE, with L for R. SELENE is yet another Greek goddess. |
||
| T | THALIA/TOSA | Indian dishes with a taste of anise, somewhat removed from Spanish omelette, for a Japanese fighting dog (6; 4) |
| THALI (Indian dishes) A. And yet another Greek goddess. TOS(tad)A: a tostada is a tortilla fried until it is crisp. TOSA is a Japanese fighting dog. |
||
| U | UT INFRA/ULLER | Drunken fault-finder fled off, as below, found in scullery (2,5; 5) |
| *(FAULTFINDER) less FLED. Hidden in “scullery”. ULLER seems to be a variant spelling of a Norse or Germanic god, ULLR. |
||
| V | VESTA/VACANCY | Top academician’s room is available — my mind’s gone blank! (5; 7) |
| VEST (top) A. VESTA of course is a Roman goddess. Double definition. |
||
| W | WEEPY/WOTAN | Emotional film where, oddly, top producer and youth leader are seen in Newtown (5; 5) |
| Odd letters of WhErE and initial letters of Producer and Youth. A (abbreviation of are, the metric measure) in *TOWN. WOTAN or Odin is another of the Norse gods. |
||
| X | XIPE/XANTHUS | Cricket team taking exercise at capital of ancient Lycia, so cross with one, at first (4; 7) |
| A charade of XI (a cricket eleven) and PE; this is the solution which ignores the small child at city, the full name of this Aztec god being Xipe Totec. The more usual spelling of the capital of ancient Lycia is Xanthos, but Xanthus is the only solution that fits the grid. The word play seems to be a simple charade of X AN and THUS (so), with “at first” indicating that “cross” and “one” come first. |
||
| Y | YMIR/YONKERS | Covered in hoar frost up around Orkneys and New York city (4; 7) |
| RIMY (rev). YMIR is another character from Norse mythology. *ORKNEYS. |
||
| Z | ZETES/ZIGGURAT | Some prize testimonial in which dozing beggar mourns deaths, all in the centre of stepped tower (5; 8) |
| Hidden in “prize testimonial”, Zetes is one of the Boreads in Greek mythology. The middle letters of “dozing beggars mourns deaths” provide ZIGGURAT. |
||
*anagram
My gratitude and sympathy, bridgesong for all your work. After about three days wrestling with this, much as I usually love this type of puzzle, I concluded that life is too short to waste any more of it on this. At least I’d had to print it out from the website, so had the satisfaction of screwing it up and chucking it in the bin!
I also gave up on this in the process of trying to fit the solutions I’d cold-solved into the grid. As soon as I noticed the impossbililty, I decided to spend my time on more pressing matters.
However, I did enjoy getting as far as I got.
The neighbouring countries in FLORA are surely Liechtenstein (FL) and Austria (A). The clue doesn’t work with France, Luxembourg and Austria as only two of them are neighbours.
G Larsen @3: that was Gaufrid’s view as well, and you’re both probably right, although it depends on how you define “neighbouring”.
Thanks bridgesong and Maskarade,
I enjoyed this – a really absorbing experience.
I had MINYAE at M2 – so does the annotated solution (*(MANY + IE)). It doesn’t show up readily on google though.
I was just happy to ‘cold solve’ most of the clues. Glad I didn’t spend more time on it. Learned a lot though.
Congrats and commiserations to Bridgesong for your perseverance.
I imagine that Maskarade chose this theme as there are so many solutions with X,Y,Z in combinations that would defeat most attempts without word wizards, and even with some.
Too clever by far, and then with errors. It’s enough to make an axolotl quiver in extremis.
Thanks bridgesong. Good work Maskarade, as Daedalus. I emerged bug-eyed from the maze mid-week. Thankfully once the B-error was fixed, the thread was there. Would have taken months in the era before Google (which couldn’t help me with the fencing cry, though it had to be that). Favourites were the ones that needed no research, like the C, J, Q and W pairs.
I battled this for a long time, overcame the enumeration error to fill the grid correctly, but was ultimately defeated by FREEMEN and the M solutions. Hey ho…
Thanks, Maskarade and bridgesong.
Muffyword @5: thanks for pointing out MINYAE – it fits the wordplay better, but I would have thought that MINYAS fitted the theme better. Any classicists out there care to comment?
This was a hard slog, eventually made easier when a kind poster on the Grauniad site revealed the numeration typo. But I felt the ‘theme’ was quite loosely drawn – some were deities, some were fictional characters (C), some were Greek, some were Norse or Mexican or Roman, some were very obscure variant spellings (X, U) and as far as I can tell M was a nation/tribe rather than an individual. Not convinced by tostada = omelette, it is made with corn tortillas not tortillas as in omelettes. Sa sa – I could only find online in relation to a previous Crossword… gone are the days when a Chambers would contain all the solutions!
Can someone explain ‘ my mind’s gone blank’ in V?
I normally enjoy alphabeticals and I battled with this for a while but like others, concluded I had more important things to do. The set of solutions I solved led me to conclude the theme was Greek and Roman gods, possibly just female ones too. So it didn’t occur to me that ‘uller’ might be some sort of god even when the clue pointed to that solution.
Thanks to Bridgesong for sorting this all out. Congratulations to Maskerade for another clever construction but too obscure for me. No thanks for the error, which wasted a bit more time.
Mark@10: one of the definitions of vacancy is “emptiness of mind”. Sa sa is indeed in Chambers, both in print and digital editions.
Solved a few cold but, away from home without access to my usual resources, I decided (like others) that it was going to take far too long. Huge respect for Bridgesong for his perseverance and skill.
It would have saved much time if I had known that B and N were contenders for the same positions. I spent a long time trying to justify CLYTEMNESTER to fit with NEW MOON. It was only when I found NARCISSUS fitted elsewhere, that I understood what had happened. I did already know from early on there was something strange with the B enumeration, since I also always list the clues by clue length. However I vaguely recalled getting tripped up with something similar in a Maskarade a couple of puzzles ago.
Thanks bridgesong and Maskarade. It must be a great effort to fit all these alphabetic word pairs into such a large crossword. For me, the 15 x 15 alphabetic ones are much more fun.
Irene. I don’t read the Guardian but enjoy reading the blogs.
According to Lempriere, Irene or Eirene was one of the Horae and with Dia and Eunomia the daughters of Jupiter and Themia. They were the goddesses of the seasons.
In my experience such a mistake is very rare indeed but why did it take the Guardian four days to put it right in their Corrections and larificatios column on Wednesday? A great shame because alphabetical crosswords are often the most enjoyable.
Thanks to Bridgesong and Maskerade. These types of crossword are my absolute favourite.
I spotted the error in the number of 9 letter words early on, but decided to plough on in the hope it would all come out in the wash – which thankfully it did late on when I eventually realised the B clues were not fitting anywhere.
Only quibble is that some of the more obscure characters from mythology I’d never heard of(eg Gaea, Xipe, Uller) which could only be confirmed via Google search, have multiple spellings, so not easy to positively identify as correct.
A mistake in the Guardian rare? Hmmm…
Anyway, thanks for the blog. We mostly enjoyed this, just found the last half-dozen or so solutions a bit of a grind. Eventually gave up on M – I’m sure I looked online for MINYAE but didn’t find it, probably wasn’t looking hard enough! Also couldn’t parse K and ended up with guessing KAKA, which I seem to remember being the Greek spirit of courage, but can’t find the reference now.
Bravissimo bridgesong! – I didn’t envy you this one.
I’m glad I persevered with it, in several sessions, finishing on Sunday afternoon, with huge admiration for Maskarade’s skill and ingenuity.
Like Muffyword @5, I entered MINYAE first, because that’s what the wordplay seemed to indicate but wasn’t really happy with it, since, as Mark @10 says, the Minyae http://www.mythindex.com/greek-mythology/M/Minyae.html were a race and all the other answers were individuals.
Like trenodia @10, I think this http://www.theoi.com/Ouranios/HoraEirene.html is the better-known Eirene / Irene but it really doesn’t matter. [Bridgesong, the Wiki page you found gives a link to ‘Eirene [Greek goddess]’.]
Many thanks to Bridgesong for a super blog and to Maskarade for a very satisfying challenge.
Thanks to Maskarade and bridgesong.
I was determined not to be defeated by this and used up a large chunk of Saturday. I had to consult a help page to sort out the numbering problem, and Google to check the more obscure references. As I was severely jet lagged after a flight from Japan I doubt I could have done anything more useful that day…
Did anyone else think Bombshell (Boom! Boom!), even if not totally parsable, was a pretty decent answer for the second B clue? We had it in for ages until T became unsolveable.
Finished by midday Sunday with a lot of help from Robert Graves and Wikipedia. A trickier theme than the Easter car makes/models perhaps, but both were great Alphabeticals.
I had a busy weekend and the week to follow was also a bit crowded, so I had to give up on this puzzle as I was tempted to keep going back and back to it when I really didn’t have the time or the energy. A pity as I got around 26 of the clues out – but had less luck with fitting them into the grid. Had a bit of fun with what I did attempt, but ultimately not much satisfaction. All praise to Maskarade for setting such an intricate puzzle and to those who managed a complete solve. Many thanks to bridgesong for a detailed explanatory blog.
I normally solve this large alphabetics by first analysing the letter count in a spreadsheet. This alerted me to a problem as I had an odd number of 9 and 7s (I think). In retrospect I could have deduced from this that a clue with two equal enumerations needed to be replaced by a (9;7) or (7;9) to come to the correct number of clues to match the grid.
I could have got the correct number for each letter count from the actual grid and this would have enabled me to sort out the error as there was only one (8;8) enumeration. There was going to be 52 solutions and there were 52 lights so no jiggery pokery splitting solutions across lights. However I decided to just started solving the clues until I came to an obvious answer that didn’t fit the enumeration in the clue and take it from there. (I guessed that a correction would soon follow in the paper although this did take more time than I expected)
I enjoyed this. The best from Maskerade yet as the cluing was much improved IMHO.
For KILT I took material for a specific purpose left for as the word play with “for” as an anagram indicator for “kit” and “l”. I did toy with “kitset” for “”material for a specific purpose” and “left for spirit of a dead person” included in the wordplay to indicate “tse” replaced by “l”. Unfortunately “tse” can’t mean “spirit of a dead person” 🙂
I also took “Food fit to eat on fast-days” as a DD for MAIGRE as it can mean “the food itself” or be an adjective to describe its aptness. (The OED does indicate that MAIGRE can also be a noun)
Finally a gripe. This board should be the only place to comment on this prize puzzle. The posting on the weekly puzzles about people’s problem with the puzzle and its errors was inappropriate and very annoying. The rule is quite clear. “No posting on a live Prize puzzle”. How difficult is that to understand.
If you’re worried about something talk to a friend or The Guardian. Then at least you won’t be interfering with other people’s solving. (Perhaps we could have an extra “board” for discussion of possible errors with puzzles. At least then people consulting this would be ready for “spoilers”.)
Found this a tough but rewarding challenge. Realised there was something wrong with the enumerations before writing anything in so that didn’t cause too many problems. Plenty of web searches needed to confirm some of the less familiar solutions. Another very ingenious gridfill.
Thanks to Maskarade and bridgesong
Thanks Maskarade for the alphabet challenge and to bridgesong for explaining it so well.
Fortunately I had picked up the ref to the error in last week’s blog so a visit to the online edition of the Prize (where the enumeration error for B had been corrected) saved some anguish.
For a while (I was convinced the theme was moons of Saturn (RHEA and YMIR both fall in that category ) then thought (on getting CLYTEMNESTRA, NARCISSUS etc that it might be more generally Greek Mythology, before eventually the more general mythology theme dawned.
All good fun, but dare I say it became a bit of a struggle towards the end – as others pointed out some of the themed solutions are super obscure and I found some of the clueing a bit variable in tone. e.g. Vacancy was so obvious I was suspicious ! Kilt – I could see ‘kit’and I could see l and the definition, but they just don’t seem to fit together. Many other clues were very nicely done though both the themed and non-themed J for instance
Ref FLORA, not sure this already got put in, but FL is the car code for Lichtenstein which neighbours Austria (A).
Ref MAIGRE – my CHambers says it is also ‘ a large Mediterranean food fish’ so this is a double definition.
Ref KAMA – I had entered this in the grid purely because KAMA was in my ‘mythology’ list, I now can see that KA = an ancient Egyptian term for a the spirit or soul within a person a god or statue of a dead person – I can see the construction, but it is obscure and a bit tenuous.
Great puzzle! But did anyone notice the other error in the B entry?
BROS were a trio, not a duo!
I also had MINYAE. mainly because it fits the wordplay better than MINYAS. A group still fit the theme of “gods or other mythical characters”.
Mark @10
SOED
vacancy
…
7
…
b Lack of intelligence; inanity; mental vacuity. m19.
I didn’t start this until Wednesday, so when I printed off the pdf it had the correct enumeration for B (7;9).
The quality of this crossword was right up there with previous ‘double alphabeticals’ by Maskarade. I solved exactly half of all the clues (26 out of 52), including all the longest ones (9 letters or more) except BIRDCALLS, and I managed at that time to ink in 15 and pencil in 6 of those 26 answers. Much of the NW and SE corners remained blank.
However, the theme then effectively stopped me in my tracks, as it was something I know so little about. It was already a joyless task having to look everything up, and with the prospect of more of the same to get the answers to fill the blank corners of the grid was too much.
This is not Maskarade’s fault, of course, and I applaud him for creating such a clever puzzle like the others that I have tackled (and still remember). Sometimes I like to learn as I solve, but unfortunately I had no interest in this theme – quite apart from my ignorance of it!
I’m grateful to Mark @10 for explaining, from a position of knowledge, some of the doubts I had about what the theme really was.
I thought of BIRDCALLS (a better solution than BIRDSONGS, having just ‘BI’ at the time), but I never knew that to be one word. I’m still not sure.
Thanks to Maskarade and bridgesong.
Its all been said: Well done bridgesong, too much obscurity and definitions too vague to make up the unknown names.
What I found most frustrating is that all lists on Google relating to mythical beings/deities etc that I could find were separated into different parts of the world. So if I was close to an answer it was not easy to confirm by Googling once I had ascertained that they were not restricted to Norse, Roman or Greek.
Attempting it this way maybe considered as a cheat but did anyone really complete this without using search engines or other modern technology?
A very clever puzzle I’m sure, but . . .
Thanks Maskarade & bridgesong
I really enjoyed this, despite having to guess ‘n google a fair few of the more obscure mythological references, and relished the challenge it provided.
I’m another one who had MINYAE.
TB @ 26: I suspect Maskarade may have been referring to the fact that Bros reformed and toured as a duo this year.
Me @ 30
I meant to check before I posted, but the graun annotated solution of the puzzle does have MINYAE.
Thank you Maskarad and bridgesong.
I had checked the comments under Friday’s Cryptic on the Guardian site while solving, so was not confused by the enumeration error, however, I first thought of BITTERN for the Boom!Boom!
It took me until Wednesday to solve all the clues, with help from google – the most annoying was that for SA SA (ça ça, French) since I do not have, nor want, Chambers, but finally ran it down as sa-sa in Letter VIII of Jonathan Oldstyle by Washington Irving.
Filling the grid was no real problem, the NE and SW quadrants were easy to fill, but the positioning of the four 8 letter answers in the other two quadrants took me a while to work out.
PS @32, I had IE involved with MANY to give MINYAE.
PPS, it must be an error as Eileen @19 indicates.
I finally finished this this morning and -I’m rather glad to see the back of it. Not that there was no cleverness involved. BIRDCALLS was quite brilliant, POETICAL was good,and there were more I could mention. My problem was that the theme was too wide and it’s rather difficult to define precisely what it was. There was also the error which certainly didn’t help matters. Still, with the help of Mrs PA and various texts, the puzzle was completed. However, I did find this harder than previous alphabeticals and I did say as much in one of my posts. If anybody found that a spoiler then I’m sorry but I really don’t see that it was.
Thanks Maskarade.
SS @ 30: Seems my current pop knowledge is lacking! Apologies. (I spent ages trying to think of another short-named duo starting with B!)
Really enjoyed the puzzle though. Esp BIRDCALLS
Hi Cookie @34 – I didn’t mean to imply that there was an error: both solutions seem to work, in different ways.
Eileen @37, apologies, I did not mean to imply that you indicated Maskarade had made an error, I also thought the parsing could be either solution, but the ‘that’ appears to be surplus if MINYAS is the answer, there is either an ‘error’ in the blog or the annotated solution.
The B misprint meant great chagrin till Wednesday when I looked on the website and found 7,9 instead of the paper 8,8. It was a pity a note wasn’t attached to Monday or Tuesday’s cryptic alerting the wrong word-lengths- not all of us use the web as our first resort.Thereafter it was fun but too dependent on Google for the mythical figures. Still not happy with KILT clue and others lacked link words. Nonetheless a brilliant work, continuing this double jigsaw theme.
Cookie@38: I think the answer is that there is an error in the blog, since the annotated solution gives MINYAE, but I still think that MINYAS would fit the theme better, for reasons given by Mark@10 and Eileen@19. Perhaps Maskarade will drop in and let us have his definitive answer?
Such a pity it’s an unchecked letter: I feel for those people who, after all that effort, chose the ‘wrong’ answer and submitted their solution.[ Of course, the annotated solution doesn’t necessarily indicate Maskarade’s intention – it would be good if he would let us know.]
Eileen @41
I completely agree. Based on all the relevant comments here, I can’t see how either of these two ‘solutions’ to M (MINYAE and MINYAS) can be fairly disallowed, even though (obviously) there could only be one published answer. Most interesting of all, as you say, would be to see what the setter intended.
I had MINYAE, by the way, believing it to fit the clue well and not finding MINYAS anywhere at the time.
I managed to complete this puzzle on the Monday morning, but I have to say that finishing it brought more relief than satisfaction. Thankfully I did discover the enumeration error quite early in the piece. A very clever puzzle nevertheless which stirred memories of Araucaria’s vowelless campanology-themed effort many years ago.
One thing I am certain of is that solving this puzzle would have been quite impossible back in the days when the only solving “aids” available were Chambers, Pears Cyclopedia and a thesaurus !
JohnB … most of “mythology ” answers were checked against a list in my trusty Collins Gem — a tiny volume (albeit 500 pages ) The Mythology list alone probably has 2000 + entries sorted by word length then initial letter. Sound on the Greek/Romans Okay on the Nordic and Egyptian. Less good on Aztec
Thanks bridgesong and Maskarade. I mostly enjoyed this. Spotted the enumeration error early and through a rival site was informed on the Saturday the correct info for the B clues. After that, steady progress over the long weekend, albeit with frequent use of reference books and Google. However, I failed on Freemen (guessed Friezes: “lavish pieces”?) and sa sa (guessed ‘so so’ : “as always”?) and a few other clues I didn’t quite parse correctly. Loved the clues for ‘One Gallon’ and ‘Birdcalls’. ‘Flora’ puzzled me, as had forgotten about FL being the code for Liechtenstein, but it couldn’t have been anything else.
I revisited this several times during the week, chipping away a little each time, until a final push today (Saturday) completed it. I managed to invent a little extra difficulty for myself by choosing ALCE for the thematic A – definitely perverse, as ACIS is better known, and allows the helpful ‘some’ to indicate the hidden answer. The penny did not drop until I found I could not make everything fit.
Courageously blogged, Bridgey. Now I dont regret throwing the towel in less than halfway through.The sort of puzzle I’d like to co solve with a couple of mates in a cosy boozer
Jeff W @45, here is a reference for sa sa in Thomas Middleton’s play ‘The Roaring Girle”, I could not find it in any list of fencing ‘terms’.
Cookie @45: here is the OED entry:
See also sessa int. The French exclamation çà, çà, redupl. of çà (lit. here, hither), ‘interjection familière pour exciter, encourager’ (Littré). Formerly used by fencers when delivering a thrust. Also attrib. as in sa-sa man [compare French faire le çà-çà galant homme (16th cent. in Littré)] ; and quasi-n. as a nickname for a fencing master.
Cf. Dutch sa sa, ‘come on, cheer up, quickly, an interjection much used to stir up fighting dogs’ (Sewel).]
1607 T. Middleton Revengers Trag. v. sig. H4v Sa, sa, sa: thumpe, there he lyes.
1608 J. Sylvester tr. G. de S. Du Bartas Deuine Weekes & Wks. (new ed.) ii. iv. 87 Sa, sa (my hearts) let’s cheerly to the charge.
1697 J. Vanbrugh Æsop: 2nd Pt. 9 He’s none of your Fencers, none of your Sa Sa men.
1699 G. Farquhar Love & Bottle ii. ii. 19 And what are you good Monsieur, sa, sa?
1826 Scott Woodstock III. iv. 91 ‘Do you ever take bilboa in hand?—Sa—sa!’ Here he made a fencing demonstration with his sheathed rapier.
bridgesong @49, thank you, that is a dictionary I would love to have (I do have the COED), unfortunately I do not have a library card since I live in France and it is so expensive online.
Cookie @50
All you need is a good friend in the UK with a library card. They could look up the words for you. (Or perhaps they could think of another solution? 😉 )
Of course there is always WordWeb Pro with the SOED add-on. It is a ittle expensive (single user £55) but it is only a one-off payment and the data is then local on your own PC/laptop.
Obviously not as good as the OED but a good second best.
BNTO @51, thank you, I think my English daughter-in-law might have a library card… (oh dear, ‘might’ or ‘may’, Pierre has made me all nervous – no, I think ‘might’ is correct, of course she ‘may’ have one, unless someone is stopping her).
…still suffering after-effects from the struggle with Maskarade’s Bank Holiday Special – Pierre has blogged the Everyman today, pointing out errors of English usage, and I was disorientated.
I’m afraid, like many others, I gave up on this when I realised the enumeration error, although by then I had ascertained the theme and managed quite a few cold solves.
As I have a subscription to the paper I’m a bit disappointed that the only notification of the enumeration error was via Corrections & Clarifications as I rarely read that part – and would have expected to see it announced on the Monday anyway.
Reckon Maskarade must have pulled out all the stops, this being such a significant year for him!
I am surprised that so many people seem to have given up on this puzzle because of an error of enumeration. I cold solved most of these clues, admittedly with the help of google (I would not have submitted my grid for the prize if I were in the UK) but I enjyoed the challenge – even though I suffer from after effects…
We had France, Luxembourg and Andorra for FLORA’s neighbouring countries, though admittedly they’re not all neighbours of each other. Lichtenstein and Austria are neater, thought I didn’t know FL was Lichtenstein.
Thanks Maskarade and Bridgesong. I’d confidently filled in both Qs and Ns before getting stuck, and realising there was an error when I came to look over the tallies (my usual crutch for helping filling in a jigsaw). Luckily I went back to the website right away, having seen quite a few corrections in the Genius series (one recent puzzle being corrected twice, I think). Sadly I didn’t finish it.
I had no idea that Craig Logan left Bros early in the band’s life, leaving just the Goss brothers. I assumed they were always a trio and couldn’t bring myself to think of them otherwise. I don’t think I can entirely blame that single mental block for me not getting about a quarter of the answers though…
Thanks to all on this site. I have enjoyed your exposition and discussion more than I enjoyed solving the actual crossword. Even though we, eventually spotted the enumeration error, we still found the theme too general. We had settled upon it being gods and goddesses across a range of cultures, until we got to Clytemnestra and decided it was just any reference to ancient civilisations, which seems a bit broad. It did, however, keep us occupied for far too many Bank Holiday hours.
When, after solving a few clues, I found no way to enter the N solutions I assumed that something tricky was going on and put the puzzle aside. It was only when the illicit comments on another puzzle revealed the enumeration error that I was able to complete the puzzle, but too late to submit. (It wasn’t worth signing up to an online fax sender for a single message.)
In any case, I see I had MINYAN, which is clearly wrong, as the anagram can only give MINYAE.
peterM@59: I agree that MINYAN is indeed wrong. But MINYAS (an anagram of IS and MANY) is a real possibility although MINYAE probably fits the wordplay better.
Sometimes too much knowledge can be a dangerous thing. FLORA jumped out at me fairly quickly as F, L OR A. I didn’t even think of checking that France Luxembourg and Austria weren’t strict ‘neighbours’….and a pop duo beginning with B? Bros was the first thing that came to mind as the Goss twins. Had no idea there was once a third member….
Wish I’d thought to count the letters. Since a 7 and a 9 were missing there were 16 to find so the 8,8 at B was the obvious culprit. Simple, but too late for the weekend.
Have joined this rather late in the day – sorry!
I thought it had to MINYAE because the phrase ‘that is’ screams ‘IE’ to any solver, so any reasonable setter would not use the phrase to misdirect, particularly as the ambiguous letter is unchecked. The clue would read better without the ‘that’. But I agree MINYAS appears to fit the theme better.
I too had difficulty with KILT, and thought ‘Dress’ was doing double duty for both definition and anagram indicator.
Very enjoyable puzzle even though I was stumped by a few. Many thanks to bridgesong and the others on this page for the explanations. I had so-so as a cryptic definition of fencer’s exclamation (fencer as in someone “on the fence”), so had duels etc in the second part of the clue which certainly didn’t help. I had considered sa sa but couldn’t find a reference.