Financial Times 17,590 by Leonidas

33 comments on “Financial Times 17,590 by Leonidas”

1. Thanks Leonidas and Pete. There is a small typo in the parsing of 2dn: it should of course be POLE (staff) not POST.

2. The top half went in steadily after getting SABBATICAL my FOI which I really liked but had to return to the puzzle a couple of times in the week to finish the bottom half.

   Favourites included: CEILIDH, VACUUM, APEX, BISHOPRIC, SYRACUSE.

   Thanks Leonidas and Pete

3. A steady, thought-provoking solve from Leonidas and well worth the effort.
   I was glad 25A was one of the few musical notations I do know!
   I liked RAG DOLLS, LOCO, SUGARY, COLORADO SPRINGS, MASCARPONE (funny) and VACUUM.
   Could only partially parse MINOTAUR, SHAG, and BISHOPRIC so thanks to Pete for his well considered blog.
   One thing though, it’s BRESAOLA (there’s a typo in the grid and the blog) as per the reverse clue.
   Thanks also to Leonidas for the workout.

4. My favourites were similar to Pete’s and I add SURGEON for its surface.

   While I did enjoy and appreciate this in parts, my overall reaction was far from delight. There were just too many remote words and questionable associations for my liking and a couple of flat-out errors.

   Thanks Leanidas and thanks particularly to Pete for the blog

5. This required quite a bit of thought for me to solve. I was wondering about the parsing of COLORADO SPRINGS, i.e., surely that can’t be right? But you came up with the same thing I did, so . . . . The ads/adverts repetition confused me. I also was not sure how LOCO[motion] was supposed to work, but now it seems obvious. Poet, hmmm. Thanks.

6. Thanks, Leonidas and Pete!
   My top faves: LOCO, MINOTAUR and COLORADO SPRINGS.

7. Thanks Leonidas for another excellent crossword with my top picks being TELEVISION, SUGARY, COLORADO SPRINGS, BRESAOLA, and CEILIDH. I needed assistance to solve MINOTAUR and SHAG. Thanks Pete for the blog.

8. MINOTAUR
   (could it be possibly this?)
   Homeric character TAU
   small MINOR
   TAU Buried by MINOR
   Def: (a) cross (bull-man)

9. Although there are clear references to Theseus, Minos, and Ariadne in The Iliad (written circa eighth century B.C.), Homer never names the Minotaur.
   —National Geographic.

10. Thanks for the blog, very good set of clever clues . COLORADO SPRINGS is very neat using Time to give the US spelling of color. I liked the I-SHOP for BISHOPRIC and a very clever second definition for SHAG .
    I agree with KVa @8 MINOTAUR=cross , very deceptive clue . almost a character from Homer and TAU=cross to further confuse things.

11. 21ac (MINOTAUR): I think there is no doubt that the intended wordplay is TAU in MINOR. I have to say that the version suggested by KVa@8 had not occurred to me. So we need one of “Homeric character” and “cross” to be the definition for MINOTAUR and the other to define TAU, and it could be either way round. Again, there is no doubt that either of these is a valid definition for TAU, so which is to be MINOTAUR?

    Homeric character? As noted by KVa@9, the Minotaur is not named in either of the two epic poems attributed to Homer. However, the term “Homeric” could be taken more widely to refer to an era of Greek writing. SOED 2007 gives us “Of, relating to, or characteristic of Homer, the traditional author of two ancient epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the poems ascribed to him, or the age with which they deal; like or in the style of Homer”. Does that cover it? I think it does.

    Cross for MINOTAUR? SOED gives us “An intermixture of animal breeds or of plant varieties; an animal or plant so produced; a hybrid” and “A thing or person intermediate in character or appearance between two different things or persons”. Within the assumptions of mythology, I would say that covers it at least twice.

    Anyway, that is presumably one of the “flat-out errors” claimed by Martyn@4 identified and disposed of. I wonder which the other one was.

12. I should note that comment 10 appeared while I was typing comment 11. I did read it before posting and should perhaps have added “and supported by Roz@10” after “suggested by KVa@8” in my second sentence.

13. Parsed MINOTAUR as KVa@8 & Roz@10 The definition is “cross” – hybrid man/bull and the “Homeric character” is TAU – one of the 24 used by Homer.

14. [typo – BRESAOLA}

15. I did not quite know how to spell BRESAOLA so I am glad it was hidden.
    Pelham Barton@11 has a case for MINOTAUR being the other way round.
    buried by small (pause) cross- does give MINO TAU R , it is more clumsy but is acceptable cryptic wordplay and is used often.

16. I looked at the hidden BRESAOLA and double checked the spelling, but I did know the product – it turns up in mixed packs of Spanish cold cuts, lots around at this time of year.

    I found some of this went in very easily and other bits took ages, I had most of the bottom of the puzzle in and solved including the Springs bit of COLORADO SPRINGS fairly fast, then had to work out the top half. DIMINUENDO was a write in, as was SHAG, as I can even identify the birds, but it’s one of those names that said out loud can upset anyone in earshot, oil seed rape / canola is another. But I needed the blog to parse TELEVISION and MINOTAUR.

    Thank you to Leonidas and Pete Maclean.

17. To be pedantic BRESAOLA is Italian , coming from the Alps in Lombardy.
    Thanks to Leonidas for an enjoyable but not too taxing puzzle and to Pete for his usual immaculate blog.

18. SM@17: That will not necessarily stop people including it in packs of Spanish cold cuts, now that so much of the EU legislation protecting consumers is being cut back.

    [Incidentally, I have had a butcher’s at my copy of last week’s puzzle and found that I had no wrong letters in my answer for 16dn. but no correct unchecked letters either – just four empty spaces. ]

19. I found this very difficult and quickly gave up/resorted to the Reveal Word option in the app. I would never have thought of Motion for poet or Sugar Ray Robinson for boxer nor have I ever seen G as an abbreviation for government. I did actually get Colorado Springs and Minotaur from a few of the letters but the parsing was well beyond me. So much to learn! Thanks Leonidas and Pete

20. I meant to ask why does that’s crazy in Chicago mean LOCO?

21. Thanks leonidas and PM

    Newbie @ 19 If you’re in UK, G = Government appears regularly as part of HMG or GCHQ inter alia.

22. 9ac: Chambers 2016 gives loco (US) adj of cattle, suffering from loco disease; mad, crazy (sl)

    24dn: The idea of taking single letters from abbreviations such as HMG is far from universally accepted. G for government on its own is possibly given in Chambers, “(as in G-man below)”, with G-man n (US) an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. That could be considered an acceptable justification for the use in this clue.

23. PB @ 22: I wasn’t saying that it was de facto acceptable, merely pointing out instances where it may be seen, as per Newbie’s comment.

24. SS@23: Thank you for that clarification.

25. PB @ 22: Ah ok so it isn’t Chicago in particular just anywhere in the US.
    SS @ 21: Should the abbreviation for government not be HMG? Government disturbed by despot acting poorly(7).
    Thanks to both for your replies.

26. The MINOTAUR not appearing in Homer was one of the errors I mentioned in passing @4. KVa @8 and PB @11 have gone to great lengths to dig Leonidas and the editor out of their hole (and I thought KVa’s new parsing was ingenious), but in the end I think neither alternative is likely and they just made a mistake. Not a biggie, by any stretch of the imagination.

    Thanks again all. I enjoy these blogs and learn a lot from them. Thanks to Pete and Leonidas again, too

27. Good evening from a totally sodden North of England. Thanks to all for the comments and to Pete for the blog. Some interesting discussion points.

    KVa@8 and PB@11 are on the money: MINO(TAU)R was the construction. And ‘Homeric’ (rather than Greek) used to confuzzle, which it clearly did.

    G for government is in Chambers as the all-knowing PB states. A bit iffy I suppose, although I think it’s used fairly often. Not that that’s an excuse.

    All grist for the mill. Happy weekend to one and all.

28. Well, I got that wrong! Thanks Leonidas for putting me straight so nicely. And applause to KVa@8.

29. Leonidas@27: Thank you for popping in and clearing up the remaining doubts. Thank you also for your kind words. I think I should point out that, while I am quite good at finding sources to justify the link from clue words to parts of the answer, I often need the blogger first to sort out exactly how the clue splits up. I do not think I could write the blogs nearly as well as any of the current team.

    I took slightly early retirement in 2020 on a date planned a year in advance, so not because of Covid, but the lockdown meant that I could not spend my retirement present immediately on a foreign holiday that I had intended. I decided instead that a good thing for a present is something that I would like to have, but would not have bought out of my normal income and savings. I chose to buy the latest editions of Collins, ODE, and SOED, to go with the latest Chambers, which I already had for solving Azeds. Thus I am now well equipped to compare what these different dictionaries say.

30. Newbie@25: Is the despot a former president of Uganda, whose surname fits into the gaps in H – – M – – G?

31. Leonidas @27 – thanks, as always, for dropping in.
    If you’re still around …
    I was extremely busy with our annual Christmas Tree Festival last weekend and so left this puzzle to solve today (so that I would remember it!) and so missed much of the earlier discussion re MINOTAUR – which, I admit, left me momentarily nonplussed.
    The wordplay was obvious but I hastily took ‘cross’ as TAU
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tau_cross, which I have seen often in crosswords, rather than the more obvious Greek letter on which it is based and then was shocked to find, apparently, MINOTAUR as the definition for a ‘Homeric character’, until the penny almost immediately dropped!
    I should have known better – what a masterful piece of misdirection!
    Many thanks, as always, to setter and blogger.

32. PB @ 30: You are correct! I have a feeling you’re going to tell me why it doesn’t work…

33. Newbie@32: I would be prepared to argue that you are using “disturbed” in the same sense as a disturbed night’s sleep – apparently other kinds exist – which allows for multiple interruptions, so I think the clue works as it stands.

Comments are closed.