Azed’s change to appearing only monthly and the vagaries of the schedule mean that I haven’t blogged one of his puzzles since January, so I feel rather out of practice. Quite a lot of unfamiliar in this one, I thought, but all fairly clued as ever, though there seems to be an error in 9 down, unless I’m misunderstanding (quite possible, of course). Thanks to Azed.
| Across | ||||||||
| 1 | BOWSPRIT | Piece round prow’s buckled strong spar (8) PROWS* in BIT (piece) |
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| 7 | BRUT | Dry cask containing minimum of rosé (4) R[osé] in BUT (variant of “butt”) |
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| 10 | ILLAQUEATE | Entangle a quill mostly damaged and mostly corroded (10) Anagram of A QUIL[L] + EATE[N] (corroded) |
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| 11 | MENTO | Tutor shortened Caribbean ballad (5) A shortened MENTO[R] |
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| 12 | MILLDAM | Lady, not one poorly inside, in pond (7) ILL (poorly) in M[A]DAM |
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| 14 | PREHNITE | Mineral, 3-pin plugged (8) (THREE PIN)* |
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| 15 | VAST | Large vessel going round sea (not river), immense tract (4) SEA less EA (river) in VAT (large vessel). Vast is most commonly an adjective, but it’s also a noun meaning “an immense tract” |
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| 17 | BHARAT | Hat and bra disposed of in large country (6) (HAT BRA)* – Bharat is the name of India in Hindi and other languages |
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| 18 | DIAPENTE | Writer involved in a diet, complicated – it consists of five ingredients (8) PEN in (A DIET)* |
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| 20 | REPETEND | Recurrent refrain – see second note before favourite finish (8) RE (second note, as in do-re-mi) + PET END |
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| 21 | ARTELS | Strike alerts Russian workers’ guilds (6) ALERTS* |
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| 24 | ERRS | Sins? Regular features in terrorism (4) Alternate letters of tErRoRiSm |
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| 25 | ATTENTAT | A bit of a kip, diffident, I’ve abandoned? Unsuccessful criminal effort (8) AT + TENTATIVE (diffident) less I’VE. An AT was 1/100 of a Kip, the monetary unit of Laos. No longer as use, not surprisingly as there are currently 30335 Kip to the pound sterling |
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| 27 | RAMENTA | Ferny scales chaps cut into NZ tree (7) MEN in RATA |
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| 28 | NEHRU | Style of jacket, male, kept in vessel coming back (5) Reverse of HE in URN |
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| 29 | UNISERIATE | Urinates, ie messily, in a row (10) (URINATES IE)* |
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| 30 | MOSS | Foreign sparrow that is lost in boggy ground (4) MOSSIE (a South African sparrow) less I.E. |
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| 31 | WALLERIA | Plant genus completely surrounded by a wire twisted (8) ALL (completely) in (A WIRE)* |
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| Down | ||||||||
| 1 | BUMP | Dislodge family avoiding clown (4) BUMPKIN (clown) less KIN |
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| 2 | OPERA SERIA | Work with rubber, reverse of ideal, in Covent Garden stuff? (10, 2 words) OP (work) + ERASER (rubber) + reverse of A1 |
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| 3 | WINE-SAP | Deep-red apple from Spain we rushed, … (7) (SPAIN WE)* |
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| 4 | PLONK | …in cheap wine stink, litre bottled (5) L[itre] in PONK (smell, variant of “pong”) |
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| 5 | RAMILIES | China grass is leaning in cocked hat (8) RAMI (China grass) + LIES |
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| 6 | TULE | Bullrush in spa cut from flattened spoon (4) SPATULE less SPA |
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| 7 | BEL PAESE | Mild cheese pales when grated busy fellow swallows (8, 2 words) PALES* in BEE (busy person) |
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| 8 | RADAR | Sun before night shortened beacon? (5) RA (Egyptian sun god) + DAR[k] |
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| 9 | TEMPTERS | Such as Circe, inane and curt within similarly truncated (8) EMPT[y] (inane) in TERS[e] (curt) – the inclusion seems to be the wrong way round, though I see from another site that the printed version has “inane” and “curt” swapped |
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| 13 | A NATURA REI | One aunt, uncommon, I’ll follow, as the case indicates (10, 3 words) A + AUNT* + RARE + I |
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| 15 | VERATRUM | Hellebore plant HM placed in vessel, unusual (8) ER (the late Queen, Her Majesty) in VAT + RUM |
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| 16 | TREELESS | Grig found in lock, bare maybe (8) EEL (grig) in TRESS (lock of hair) |
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| 17 | BANG-TAIL | Gal, a bint with fringe dressed, cut square across (8) (GAL A BINT)*, with a long definition |
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| 19 | NORTHER | Wind that’s partly southern or thermal (7) Hidden in southerN OR THERmal |
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| 22 | TAMIS | Woollen material I included in circular caps (5) I in TAMS (Scottish caps, short for Tam o’ Shanter, from a Burns poem) |
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| 23 | VENAL | Meat maybe about noon, dark red in colour (5) N in VEAL. Venal is a synonym of venous, relating to veins, and can mean dark red, as deoxygenated blood (contrary to the incorrect belief that venous blood is blue) |
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| 25 | ANEW | Gradual decline, first to last, again (4) WANE (decline) with the first letter moved to the end |
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| 26 | TUNA | Fish for eel down under – it’s prickly (4) Three definitions: the well-known fish, a NZ eel and a prickly pear |
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In 10ac, in the paper edition, “mostly” appears only before “corroded”. Otherwise, not enough Ls.
I agree with Dormouse@1. I had that one marked “?”. I agree that the wordplay in 9D seems backwards. I could not find NEHRU or WALLERIA in Chambers.
I do not think A NATURA REI works , if uncommon=RARE there is no anagram indicaotor for aunt .
BANGTAIL no anagram indicator ?
TEMPTERS – curt and inane within – in the paper so fine .
ILLAQUEATE right in the paper , see Dormouse@1
What a mess , clearly no test solve or edit .
Thanks for the blog , mainly good clues , ATTENTAT is very neat , but there seem to be some mistakes in the paper and some online alterations making other clues not work .
I had the same problems with the clues mentioned by Dormouse@1 and Roz@3. I had A NATURA REI fresh in my mind from last week so had entered it in the grid before I noticed that the clue didn’t seem to work and, once I had enough checking letters, I was able to guess the others even if I was reluctant to enter answers to clues I didn’t understand. I originally had NEPHRITE at 14a which caused me problems with the first four down clues, and I needed to solve all of those clues before I could guess PREHNITE.
Like Cineraria@2, I couldn’t find NEHRU or WALLERIA in Chambers and was surprised that the former didn’t make the cut.
I noticed when I clicked on the More button in the top-right corner in the online version of this puzzle that top of the menu says ‘Azed No. 2,782 by Antony Lewis’, whatever that means.
Thanks, Azed and Andrew.