Azed 1876/Plain sailing
Posted by ilancaron on May 18th, 2008
When I’ve finished writing this blog up, I’m going to count how many Scots terms there were in clues and answers — seemed like a lot but in any event this is going to be my baseline Azed Scots/English ratio from now on, and I’ll be reporting how each future puzzle rates. Actually not that many upon recount. Only 5. Perhaps I should add in non-UK terms (e.g. from S. Africa, Australia and America as well…)?
Across
| 1 | FEE(DLO)T - old* in FEET. |
| 6 | SAROS - reverse hidden in “groupS, OR A Solo”. And it’s a Babylonian astronomical cycle — rather long (3600 years). |
| 10 | FIELDCRAFT - (Cliff rated)* |
| 11 | R,ON,C,A,DOR=rod* - it’s a fish (of the maigre family if that helps). Oh, obligatory cricket ref: ON is the “leg” side (as opposed to OFF which isn’t…). |
| 13 | DUCK - Seems like “I’ll join others in paddling” is there to disambiguate from the other option: DUNK since the N is unchecked. Other interpretations? |
| 14 | FUSTET - wouldn’t you know that if you take the alternate letters of “fouls street” you get… anyway, FUSTET is a type of sumach (a bushy tree kind of thingy…). |
| 15 | OR(VIE)TO - ref. the Italian wine (thus vino) and VIE (archaic “stake”) in root*. |
| 17 | NAUNT - it’s archaic Aunt according to C, thus “family member once”. Not sure about rest: “cutting on film-star Wayne”. |
| 20 | EAT=tea,ERIE - ref. Lake ERIE. |
| 22 | LEG,HORN - it’s a type of “straw hat” — and we have “on” being the LEG side again. |
| 24 | A,RIEN - French “has” is A (3rd person singular) and RIEN is nothing thus “love”. And ARIEN is ref. Aries the zodiac sign. |
| 25 | AUBADES - (USA abed). The dawn chorus. |
| 28 | F(INN)AC - INN in FAC[e] which is also “effrontery”. And FINNAC is a young sea trout. |
| 30 | R[ac]E,T[ens]E, first/last letter pairs of “race, tense”. It’s a neural network. |
| 32 | NULLANULLA - it’s an Aboriginal club and oddly enough NULLA (as nala) for gully shows up elsewhere as well (29D). |
| 33 | D(W)AAL - W (for wicket) in A,LAD. It’s S. African for a ’state of inattention’ (during which presumably you might miss a catch). |
| 34 | ESSEN,CE - turns out also a rather fine kind of Tokay wine. |
Down
| 1 | FORD,O - to “exhaust”. |
| 2 | ETOUDER=rerouted*,IE - from the French: “heedlessness or stupid blundering.” |
| 3 | DICKIE=”dicky” - “the driver’s seat in a carriage”. |
| 4 | LEAVE - hidden in “battLE AVErted”. |
| 5 | OLDSTER - (strol[l]er)* - exactly one L removed from “stroller”. |
| 6 | SCR(UNT)Y - nut * IN SCRY: 4 Scots terms in a single clue: SCRY for “practice crystal-gazing” (thus, observe), “unco” Scots superlative, SCRUNTY for stunted (Scots) meaning wanthriven, which is Scots for… stunted. |
| 7 | [h]ARMS - I suppose the def is “soldiering” as in an arm of the military — and “is ‘urting” is ‘arms. |
| 8 | R(APT,URE)D - APT=suitable and URE=archaic practice in RD. |
| 9 | ST,UTTER - I assume that ST is abbrev(stumped) (from cricket perhaps?) and it’s in the COD which I haven’t checked. Nice cricket surface though it must be said. Though unfortunately no mention of on or leg. |
| 12 | VENICE TALC - a type of soapstone: NICE in (lav etc)* |
| 16 | V(AGINUL)A - (A Luing)* in V,A[cre]. Hmm… interesting association of moss and vagina which I refuse to point out much less mention. |
| 18 | PLAFOND - rev(Fal) in POND. Turns out PLAFOND a term for an old version of the card game Bridge. |
| 19 | GO,NADA,L - while we’re on the subject of vaginas, might as well bring in the gonads as well. Spanish “nothing” is NADA. |
| 21 | AN,UR(O)US - didn’t know what ANUROUS nor acaudate meant until I looked them up: taillless. And URUS is an extinct wild ox. |
| 23 | WARLSE - (re laws)* — Scots wrestle which presumably is done at the Highland Games (along with eating hammers and throwing haggis). |
| 26 | BU(RL)S - R[ugby] L[eague] in BUS (coach) and turns out its an Australian term for “attempt, shot”, thus a go so the definition is “goes”. |
| 27 | SENTE - hidden in “preSENT Elections”: coin in Lesotho. However, not sure what role “inevitable” plays in: “Some change in Lesotho inevitable in present elections”. |
| 29 | NALA=rev(Alan) - ref. Alan Partridge - and NALA is a NULLA which we already know is a gully or stream. |
May 18th, 2008 at 12:32 am
I’m pretty sure that 17 across is referring to the actor ‘Naunton Wayne’.
May 18th, 2008 at 10:54 am
Yes, definitely Naunton Wayne in 17ac.
Like Ilan, I couldn’t make much sense of 13ac - I put in DUCK as the most likely answer but I’m sure there must be more to the clue than I’m seeing.
9dn - ST is indeed Stumped. I think “get out” is cunningly part of the definition.
In 1dn, “old” seems to be doing double duty: FORDO is marked as ‘archaic’ in Chambers, and Azed is usually scrupulous in indicating such things (and sometimes mentions it in the Slip).
May 18th, 2008 at 11:15 am
Come to think of it, Naunton Wayne could almost be another cricketing reference, as he was famous for playing the part of the cricket-obsessed Caldicott, alongside Basil Radford as Charters, in Hitchcock’s “The Lady Vanishes” and several subsequent films.
May 19th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Naunton Wayne??????? I have so much to learn…