Guardian Quiptic 1,198/Hectence

21 comments on “Guardian Quiptic 1,198/Hectence”

1. Re. OFTEN, Pierre, actually Scottish folk tend to use ‘outwith’ rather than ‘without’ in that sense. As a Scottish child I recall for years being baffled by ‘There is a green hill far away / Without a city wall …’ Why would a green hill have a city wall?

2. You’re right, Spooner’s catflap – ‘outwith’ is what I have heard north of the border.

3. Another nice clear Quiptic with some lovely clues.

   Thank you to Pierre and Hectence.

4. I am always impressed by the way in which Hectence manages to serve up pangrams so frequently without seeming to repeat clues. As always, very enjoyable. There has been some comment on the Grauniad site that the puzzle is too difficult for beginners: I can understand that, but the helpful grid and generous crossers should be of assistance.

5. Thanks both.
   I think that my grandfather told me about A-Z maps 🙂

6. Enjoyable puzzle, neither too easy nor too difficult.

   Liked CALL A TAXI.

   Thanks, both.

7. Just the right level for a Quiptic in my experience. I wasn’t aware of TIN meaning ‘money’ in PUT IN JAIL but it couldn’t have been anything else so I went with it. Liked CALL A TAXI, BESEECH and LIGHT RAIN.

   A lovely start to the week, thanks both.

8. Thanks Hectence and Pierre
   Lovely puzzle. Lots of good clues. I particularly liked OFTEN.

9. Thanks Hectence and Pierre. As a relative beginner I enjoyed this.

   I struggled a bit with Crave as synonym for BESEECH, although I see an archaic use listed: “I must crave your indulgence”. If I think of a person craving attention, I understand that as a state of desire, rather than a request. Do I misunderstand that, or is it an example of an archaic use gradually morphing into a more modern meaning?

10. Fairly breezy for me, although a few tricky bits. TIN and that sense of ‘comprehend’ were new to me, and I imagine many newbies – although both were gettable after a back-parse.

    Particularly liked GIZMO and BESEECH.

    Thanks Pierre and Hectence.

11. I’m certainly a newcomer, but hopefully improving, so puzzles at this level are great for me.

    Particularly loved STARGAZER, as while celebrity is certainly (STAR), I felt (GAZER) could be either from “viewer” or “astronomer”. Likewise the answer itself could apply to both as definitions. Firstly, to “astronomer” as parsed by Pierre, but also to “viewer”, as a member of an audience, or even watching TV. So a great clue with 2 ways to the answer, but maybe that’s just me!

    Many thanks to Hectence and Pierre.

12. I don’t see why ‘surge’ is in the clue to 23a

13. I wouldn’t classify this as a Quiptic, but I completed it and I’m no expert. so maybe I’m being picky.

    I enjoyed AGGRAVATE, SURRENDER and CALL A TAXI.

    Wasn’t BESEECH used recently? In any event it was my FOI.

14. peterM @12 – ‘surge’ is a synonym of (to) PRESS, as in a crowd – sadly resonant given the news from South Korea over the weekend.

15. Most enjoyable, as I always expect from Hectence. EASED is a very neat clue.

    My only gripe was some difficulty working out where the O came from in OBLIQUE. Didn’t twig that “to back” meant “the back letter of the word TO”. Thought it must be part of the definition, ie “inclined to back”. Although, come to think of it, an oblique stroke is one that’s inclined forwards, isn’t it? Hmmm.

    But as long as the genuine novices like Pipit @9 and Just Mick @11 are happy with it, all is good.

    Thanks for the blog, Pierre.

16. Pipit raises an interesting question @9 re crave/BESEECH. Looking at etymonline, it seems you are right to suspect that crave = request/beg is the original meaning. Old English crafian meant ‘to ask/implore/demand by right’, cognate with Old Norse krefja, ‘to demand’. ‘Current sense “to long for, eagerly desire” is c. 1400, probably through intermediate meaning “to ask very earnestly” (c. 1300).’

    As Pipit says, the older sense survives in phrases like ‘I crave your indulgence’.

    Meanwhile, Gervase @32/39 over in “the other place” (on the Anto blog – as Gervase concedes, it’s not his day 😉 ) makes a slightly different point – you beseech someone but crave something. That was my feeling too – but I discover that Wiktionary gives request/beg for as a 2nd meaning for ‘beseech’, quoting ‘The tickets had all been given out, begged, besought long ago’. Collins online similarly, though only in the American English section.

    Great surface though, as Pierre says.

    Talking of rare/archaic usages, my take on HAPHAZARD is that ‘comprehend’ as an insertion indicator has to be understood in the French sense of ‘include’. Trying to arrive at some sense of containment via the ‘get’/’understand’ meaning is a stretch and a half, and then some. (Could ‘understand’ be used as an insertion indicator?)

    So, does comprehend = include exist in English? It certainly used to: ‘In the second century of the Christian Æra, the empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the earth’ (Gibbon, Decline and Fall, 1776) What about modern usage? Collins online gives ‘The course will comprehend all facets of Japanese culture’. I googled that to find the source, but everything pointed me back to the dictionary example sentence! It’d be interesting to find an instance ‘in the wild’.

    After all that, though – and yes, I apologise for the long and winding post – I’d still be inclined to indulge comprehend = include, even if it’s archaic, on the basis that ‘comprehensive’ = ‘all-inclusive’ is a helpful pointer in the right direction.

    Thanks Hectence and Pierre, and anyone who has waded through this post. I sympathise with those on the G thread who found it tough for a Quiptic, but then I often struggle to get on Hectence’s wavelength, and as W says @15, it’s clear from the contributions above that some who are at beginner level found it hit the right spot.

17. Thanks both. A bit Mummy Bear but lots of entertainment – GARDENING, LIGHT RAIN, Y-FRONTS, CHAFE and more besides.

    I found QUASH=’defeat’ a bit archaic, but not ‘comprehend’. I wish I could point to an example but I would have no problem saying eg that the bill comprehends a service charge and expecting to be understood.

18. Pipit@9 and Essexboy@16 crave meaning beseech reminds me of the delightful archaic phrase “might I crave a boon” which occurs a few times in the Jeeves and Wooster stories.

19. Essexboy @16 I didn’t have a problem with either bit of language, but I spent a lot of my life steeped in church archaisms from the Book of Common Prayer and King James Bible, so those meanings are familiar. Doesn’t Hectence usually have church or Biblical references? (Usually my first clues in)

20. Not sure if it was intentional, but I enjoyed the visual of PUTIN JAIL at 10a. Thanks for the explanations, Pierre, and to Hectence.

21. This is one which would have seemed way too hard for a quiptic a few months ago to this newbie; now seems just right to be satisfying. I may have gone from beginner to improver as I’ve picked up more of the common codes.
    Beginners: don’t be out off by reading how easy some people here find crosswords like this- it will come if you stick at it!

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