27682 Thursday, 4 June 2020 Io, Io, it’s off to work we go.

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
A mildly classical feel to this one, with the sort of vocab that turns up in Shakespeare but not much elsewhere, some Chaucer, some Greek mythology and Genesis to play with, though for the most part you don’t need to know that stuff to conquer the clues. Throw in some astronomy, and add a legal term which is a bit whiskery, and a probably unfamiliar species of grass and you have a crossword where trusting the wordplay is just something you have to do.
I fairly whizzed through in 14 minutes or so, but I think my speed was enhanced by being able to enter 1ac without delay
I’ve done my best to annotate the obscurer references with more or less accurate background, and my reasoning, with the clues, definitions and SOLUTIONS, can be found
[Here (click to open)]

Across
1 Scottish island to have a go at crime (8)
BARRATRY “Fraudulent practices on the part of the master or mariners of a ship to the prejudice of the owners; the stirring up of suits and quarrels, forbidden under penalties to lawyers; the purchase or sale of offices of church or state”. So now you know. I am fortunate that I knew both the word (though not with any certainty its meaning) and the Scottish island, BARRA, and could therefore have a go, TRY, to complete the word. And that both occurred at first reading. Others might have struggled, there being a lot of Scottish islands that might do.
5 Time to encounter sorceress in the grass (6)
TWITCH T for time and WITCH for sorceress, and hope that the combined result isn’t just a tic. Be assured, it is also a kind of grass.
10 Possess top-class modern technology to gain advantage (4,3,4,2,2)
HAVE THE BEST OF IT Two shots at the same phrase, the jocular first of which requires you to read IT as I.T.
11 Cross gentleman nabbing a commissioned officer (7)
SALTIRE The Scottish one, white X on blue. Or SIRE, gentleman “nabbing” A LT (lieutenant)
12 Passage of time managed by model (7)
TRANSIT T(ime) (again, already!) plus managed: RAN, plus model (as a verb) SIT
13 Water flowing badly, river choked by spicy stuff (8)
MILLRACE Carefully lift and separate. Badly: ILL plus R(iver) stuffed into MACE answering for “spicy stuff”. Choked more as “strangled by” than “clogged with”, which would be the other way round
15 Coffee encountered, getting knocked over (5)
DECAF Which is FACED, encountered, reversed
18 Retro record by the French star (5)
ALGOL If you know it not (it’s a variable in Perseus), trust the cryptic. LOG for record, LA for the (in) French shackled together and “retro” reversed.
20 A yacht was wrecked — no hint of hope for me? (8)
CASTAWAY One of those approaching &lit, the “me” being the subject of the little story being old and the wordplay. It’s an anagram (wrecked) of A YACHT WAS with the H (a hint of Hope) removed
23 A sweetheart’s getting caught in hiding places perhaps (7)
ALCOVES Recesses that could serve as hiding places even if that’s not their primary purpose. Sweetheart’s (the S is necessary) gives LOVES, which gets
C(aught) in(side). The A you need is in plain sight.
25 I may be found out by this lab equipment! (7)
AMMETER A cryptic hint, where I is not me, but the symbol of electric current, which can be measured by our answer
26 A son’s nurture say may be disturbed by these big beasts (15)
TYRANNOSAURUSES A big anagram (may be disturbed) of A SON’S NURTURE SAY
27 Within country’s borders it’s somehow vulgar and gloomy (6)
CLOUDY The borders of country give the C and Y, LOUD for vulgar is within
28 Pupils maybe hinder class – terrible fool must go! (8)
CHILDREN Maybe belongs to the definition, terrible indicates the anagram, of HINDER CLASS without the fool, ASS.

Down
1 Order fellows into risky venture (6)
BEHEST Fellows are HES, and the risky venture an BET. Assemble
2 Rod turns up with Heather, whooping it up (9)
REVELLING With the definition hinting at an ING ending, LING is an easy guess for the heather. The rod is a LEVER, which you need turned up
3 Mound is a new work: last of earth going in (7)
ANTHILL My last but one in, worrying that it might be a word for a mound that I was unfamiliar with. It’s not. You have A N(ew) TILL for work with the H, the last of eartH, thrown in.
4 One telling tale about naughty woman (5)
REEVE A Canterbury pilgrim, about: RE and naughty woman: EVE, guilty of primeval scrumping
6 Ground wanted around lake? Don’t build on it, surely? (7)
WETLAND Another &litish sort of clue. Ground is an adjective to indicate an anagram. In this case of WANTED, around L(ake)
7 Quarrels difficult to deal with, leader being put down (5)
TIFFS Takes STIFF for difficult to deal with, and put the leading S to the end
8 Get on well, having success with one swell guy (3,2,3)
HIT IT OFF Repoint success: HIT plus one: I plus swell guy TOFF
9 Cattle going to water in Scotland, being smart (8)
NEATNESS NEAT is an old-fashioned term for cattle. From a cobbler at the beginning of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar:
“As proper men as ever trod upon neat’s leather have gone upon my handiwork.”
Add the best known water in Scotland
14 African party on estate with men, one from a previous generation (8)
ANCESTOR The African party is the ANC, African National Congress, EST is short for estate, and OR is or familiar men who are Other Ranks. Parsed after submission
16 Sir dealt with cheats, fearsome disciplinarian? (9)
CHASTISER Dealt is the anagram indicator, and you have SIR with CHEATS tp play with. It’s possible to accept that”fearsome” is the anagram indicator
17 Like rock when submerged by sea (8)
BASALTIC I refer McColleagues to my entry a month ago, when this last came up. This time it’s a bit simpler, just AS for when, submerged in the BALTIC sea
19 Animated demon about to capture loveless one (7)
LIVENED Your demon is the DEVIL “about”, so reversed, capturing ONE without the O, indicated by loveless.
21 Officer looked up to by a learner but not journalist (7)
ADMIRAL Looked up to ADMIRED, add A L(earner) but take away the ED journalist
22 Petition stars outside entrance to show (6)
ORISON More Shakespeare, an it please you, from Hamlet: “nymph, in thy orisons, be all my sins remembered”. The stars this time are ORION, with the S from the entrance to Show
24 Dog having white heifer as companion? That’s an unusual thing (5)
CURIO You can work out the dog being a CUR, which leaves IO. She’s a mortal woman turned into a white heifer either by Zeus who was infatuated with her or by the jealous Hera. It all worked out well enough, resulting several generations later in Perseus
25 Embarrass a bishop with a demand to keep quiet (5)
ABASH A in plain sight, B(ishop) A again and SH for demand to keep quiet

64 comments on “27682 Thursday, 4 June 2020 Io, Io, it’s off to work we go.”

  1. This was a struggle for me, and so far anyway, it would seem for few others; I’m one of two whose NITCH is in the red. I DNK BARRATRY, and DNK BARRA, so I went with ARRANTRY, which of course kept 1d and 3d out of reach. I did know ALGOL, but couldn’t remember it, and went with RIGEL, postponing the question of what the hell GIR is. BASALTIC finally cleared that up. POI BEHEST, if I recall, LOI MILLRACE (I was taking ‘choke’ in the wrong sense, looking for a spice inside). Z, you meant HAVE THE BEST…

    Edited at 2020-06-04 02:02 am (UTC)

  2. I went for MALTESE for the cross before realizing it doesn’t work since there is MALE and A LT alright, but they overlap. I had no idea about the white heifer. I thought it was going to be a word for a dog with WH replaced by CH. Or something like that. Once I had CURIO, I still couldn’t see how it worked. I just know IO as a moon of Jupiter, although most of those names come from mythology.

    I had no idea about BARRANTRY but I lived in Scotland for years and at one point cycled the whole lenght of the western isles. Barra Airport’s runway is the beach, and so the plane schedule depends on the tides since there is only enough space when it is not too close to high tide.

    Edited at 2020-06-04 03:03 am (UTC)

  3. Got everything except for barratry even toying with purgatry…

    COD castaway.

  4. glad to be reminded of the Travelling Wilberries at 22d.
    Thanks Z for parsing “ammeter” as we failed to spot I as the current, and for elucidating Io and her misfortune at LOI “curio”.29mins
  5. I really had to cheat for BARRANTRY, utterly new term. Never heard of AMMETER either, for that matter. Had to check ALGOL, dimly remembered… a three-star system, as Rigel is not… I should try these in the morning, and after coffee, perhaps, but I’d be late for the blog—I get up at 10—and I never have time before I start work anyway (“Happy is the country that has no history”). Haven’t done yesterday’s yet!

    The clue for CASTAWAY was fine indeed.

    Edited at 2020-06-04 05:42 am (UTC)

  6. I was on target for another half-hour solve but hit a brick wall when I reached the final SW corner. I had the long word at 26ac but I stared blankly at 17 18 19 23 24 and 27 for what seemed like ages before they eventually started to give up their secrets. NHO of ALGOL, and the rock at 17dn was always going to give me problems. 40 minutes.

    Edited at 2020-06-04 05:27 am (UTC)

  7. Like Vinyl I had all the GK which helps enormously with this puzzle. BARRATRY a write in – came across it years ago in a marine insurance context. Liked AMMETER. Good blog z8
    1. I did a quick course in insurance terminology when I started in the IT Department of the ill-fated Independent Insurance back in 1978. BARRATRY was covered then. I’ve been waiting ever since for a setter to throw in BOTTOMRY BOND !
      1. Well, why not! I thought it a rather clever device – using the ship itself as collateral but the bond only payable if the ship survives the voyage. We forget what huge risks those early merchants and sailors took.
  8. Annoyingly did rather well at this but put in ANTHIIL. Bah! BARRATRY rang a vague bell once I had the B. Rather starry with ALGOL and ORI(S)ON.

    COD: AMMETER, was thinking of iodine for a bit.

    Yesterday’s answer: it is generally accepted that Milton contributed most new words to English.

    Today’s question: estimate what percentage the area of Scotland is of the area of England (I don’t mean the former is contained in the latter, of course).

    Edited at 2020-06-04 06:34 am (UTC)

    1. The product of those famous and angry men (5)

      (Think of Timmy the dog by Henry Fonda)

      Edited at 2020-06-04 07:37 am (UTC)

    2. I know Scotland is annoyingly large when I drive to Aberdeen, which isn’t even anywhere near the furthest bit. I’d guess between 50% and 60%, not counting Wales of course.
  9. Well, I stuffed this one up in a few different ways. After spending my last ten minutes coming up with BARRATRY once ARRANTRY was proved wrong, I came here to find I was right, and then was going through the blog for elucidation and came across ORISON, which I’d simply completely missed going back to and left unfilled. D’oh! I like to think I’d’ve got it fairly quickly with all the crossers, but who knows? (At least it was some stars I’d heard of, unlike ALGOL, which I of course only know as the computer language…)

    Edited at 2020-06-04 06:48 am (UTC)

  10. 23 minutes, but one wrong apparently. I had SWITCH, with the time being a second. And there is switch grass, Panicum Virgatum, as I’m sure you all know. I constructed BARRATRY which sounded vaguely familiar, and shrugged at the last two letters of CURIO. COD to AMMETER, although the i would usually be lower case. I was on wavelength, enjoying this until I discovered I’d switched the TWITCH. Thank you Z and setter.
      1. I read Physics, Jim. We mainly used lower case, which did cause confusion with the square root of -1, which became j in electronics equations. I didn’t say that the capital wasn’t used.
  11. …And be among her Cloudy trophies hung.
    20 mins with yoghurt, granola, etc.
    No real dramas or eyebrow Twitches.
    Thanks setter, great blog Z.
  12. Got there, with crossed fingers for BARRATRY. Knew BARRA, but nho the crime.

    AMMETER LOI, dimly remembered from school physics.

    Somehow remembered a white heifer, but thought it was Europa? Pasiphae?

    Disquieted at ‘naughty woman’ for Eve – a story used to oppress women for thousands of years.

    22’33”, thanks z and setter.

    1. I only realized some time after reading this blog that I’d blithely typed in CURIO while in fact thinking of Europa.
  13. 28:45
    Pleasant puzzle. Looked forbidding at the start, but once I got going it was fine.
    Thanks z.
  14. I was not enamoured by 26ac TYRANNOSAURUSES as ‘big beasts’ which was hardly cryptic after such a decent anagaram. It was just a QC write in with two extra letters. Neither my

    FOI 10ac HAVE THE BEST OF IT – what else could it be!

    LOI 10ac ALGOL – waited just in case.

    COD 24dn CURIO

    WOD BARRATRY but simple cluing

    I should have been a bit faster: I dawdled indifferently.

    Please notice thew social distancing belot!

    Edited at 2020-06-04 02:32 pm (UTC)

  15. No real problems, unlike seemingly most solvers above. But the snitch is 97, so it’s not too hard.
    FOI barratry microseconds after cursing setters for including obscure Scottish islands (& obscure Scottish words, found only in Chambers, why waste a good rant), so apologies all round. Only hold-ups were Algol – 5-letter star, middle letter G, backward ‘le’ in it – knee-jerk reaction is write in Rigel and move on. Like Matt only know of algol as an ancient language. And LOI curio, which I just couldn’t see, and worried about corgi. White heifers completely mystify me, not a classicist.
    Very pleasant, liked the castaway, MER at ammeter’s definition – used them often at work, on-site in steel-capped boots and overalls, never been near a lab in my life.
  16. Another finger-crosser for BARRATRY at the end for about an hour solve, plus nap. I liked all the &littish ones, especially AMMETER, though I too was thinking Chemistry rather than Physics for a while. With a few obscure ones, helped by wordplay, I found this very satisfying to complete
    1. Indeed the I just *had* to be iodine. Mass spectrometer didn’t fit, though.
  17. 17:13. A nice middle-of-the-road puzzle today. NHO BARRATRY, but trusted to the wordplay. Held up most by the SW corner, taking ages to see it was plural dinosaurs and then having no idea about the white heifer. FOI HAVE THE BEST OF IT. LOI ALCOVES. I liked CASTAWAY and AMMETER best. Thanks Z and setter.
  18. 16.18. An interesting range of clues to present a variety of challenges. Won’t claim to have known them all- barratry, reeve and twitch being those that most come to mind but all achievable via the phrasing.
    FOI hit it off, LOI alcoves( straight after livened). Liked millrace and children and pleased with myself for recognising the reference to Io. Nice to feel smug now and again, no doubt will be brought back to earth tomorrow.
  19. Some really obscure stuff today, and BARBATRY did for me – sounded like it might be connected with barbarianism, somehow – after a lucky stab at AMMETER, fingers crossed for ORISON and 2 minutes spent trying to figure out REEVE. Not just a magistrate, then. I don’t recall having heard of a MILLRACE or ALGOL either, but the wordplay was kinder there. 11m 29s with the error.

    Edited at 2020-06-04 09:48 am (UTC)

  20. 50 years ago I crewed in a couple of Barra Head races. Start on Isle of Arran, South round Mull of Kintyre, head North and round Barra Head, turn right and a spinnaker run down to Tobermory on Mull. Barra-try sounded right, 1d 2d 3d and 4d followed so though I had never heard of Barratry it had to be be the answer.
    Richard
  21. Including a mistype mistake (grr). Boy that top left was tough. Squeezing out barratry (which I checked in a dictionary), behest, reeve and saltire took at least 15 minutes. Not helped by my default reaction to the word cross being to think of weird animals. Thanks for explaining reeve.
  22. Several holes to fill at the end, including BARRATRY which had to be right but NHO. Also NHO that meaning of REEVE, my LOI. The AMMETER was pencilled in until I came here, no eye deer….
  23. BARRATRY, TWITCH and the white heiffer were my unknowns today, but I knew BARRA and had BEHEST, so the island choice was limited, grass from wordplay and CURIO from crossers and definition. Loved AMMETER. Knew ALGOL as a star and the first programming language I ever used. I began with HAVE THE ___ __ IT and HIT IT OFF from there. AMMETER was my LOI. 16:57. Thanks setter and Z. Nice puzzle.
      1. Thanks John. Total opposite to yesterday when I was thrashing around like a fish out of water!
  24. 23 min. except that I forgot to go back to balastic, which I knew didn’t feel right. Quite annoying after a fair run. Not so keen on ‘hes’ as ‘fellows’, or Eve as naughty come to that; but an interesting range of reference. Had to get away from Rigel as a star. Had forgotten Io’s story and now think of her (albeit rarely) as one of Jupiter’s moons; but good to be reminded of the eventful background. Also of the rather splendid ‘orison’, used by Hamlet (‘Nymph, in thy orisons Be all my sins remember’d’).
  25. For the Algol clue I said to myself “well I don’t know of any star called Algol, but lots of computer languages seem to be named after stars”. The wordplay made it seem obvious. But now that I think of it, I can’t actually think of many computer languages that are named after a star. Basic? Fortran? C?
  26. Started off fast, thinking another sub 15, but slowed to a crawl ending with MILLRACE IN 35 minutes. Liked CURIO once I’d realised it wasn’t going to be CORGI. Nice blog sir.
  27. Our blogger had a very good time. BARRATRY joins champerty and simony as a word learned long ago for an exam and promptly forgotten. I’d forgotten about ALGOL too – it sounds a bit like a disinfectant of the kind POTUS thinks might be injected to ward off a virus. This puzzle wouldn’t have been out of place in the TLS. 20.11
  28. Today’s silly mistake. 2d, the Rod that could be reversed and would fit nicely was of course Rod LAVER. So let’s just hope that there’s a word, REVALLING, with which I just happen not to be acquainted, bung it in and hope for the best. I really should learn to think twice about that sort of thing.
  29. Actually a bit quicker than that but hovered over the tick button looking askance at BARRATRY for a while. Apart from that, which I’ve never seen, I enjoyed having words like ORISON and ALGOL dragged from the memory and I particularly enjoyed AMMETER. Enough obscurity in here to make it a lovely challenge, maybe one more aligned to regular Listener solvers (like me)…?
  30. A puzzle which tested the edges of my knowledge with the star and the sort of grass, and went completely beyond my ken with BARRATRY. One of those answers which would have gone in with fingers crossed on Championship Day (as it was, I checked its existence before submitting, so if we are to be scrupulous, a technical finish with aids only).
  31. A Happier Day today, with all done and dusted in 40 minutes. I didn’t know BARRATRY or ALGOL either, but as Z8 says, I went with the wordplay and entered them both on trust. I must admit to looking them up immediately afterwards to check their meanings! No problems with the GK although I recalled Io’s story after parsing, and not being science-y, couldn’t have said whether an ammeter was something you’d find in a lab, although I was fairly sure we had one in our garage. Totally biffed, so thanks for explanation Z.

    On the whole, though, I really enjoyed this – there are a lots of ticks by the clues: SALTIRE, ANTHILL, REEVE and CURIO just for starters.

    FOI Transit
    LOI Barratry
    COD Castaway

    Thanks setter for a fun challenge, and Z8 for the usual super blog

    On edit: This is a total Fluke, but my husband has just fished out his digital multimeter which is in the drawer next to this very PC!

    Edited at 2020-06-04 02:55 pm (UTC)

    1. I don’t see why an ammeter should be lab equipment either. I have one in my (very old) car. Jeffrey
      1. The only question is, can an ammeter be used in a (presumably physics) lab? If it can, then it doesn’t matter if I’ve got one on my fridge, the clue definition is still valid.
        1. Oh I totally agree! My comment wasn’t querying whether you would or wouldn’t find one in a lab – just that the only one I know about was in our garage!
        2. I read into this a literal interpretation, as an Ammeter can be used as a polygraph, hence one ‘may be found out’.

          I came back to this puzzle last night as a spare and all done in about 38 mins, seemed to hit my GK areas quite nicely, my best time since I returned to Times daily puzzles after many years.

          Last in: millrace

  32. ….TWITCH because of a nervous tic at the side of his mouth that was very noticeable if he was annoyed (which was most of the time if I was around).

    I thought I was in trouble, being 10 clues in before putting pen to paper – quite the reverse of my recent problems, as I speeded up considerably thereafter.

    FOI/COD CASTAWAY
    LOI ALCOVES
    TIME 11:31

  33. 24:00. Clearly it was just me but I found this puzzle intensely irritating. Almost all the difficulty is from wilful obscurity rather than clever deviousness:
    > BARRATRY: double obscurity
    > HAVE THE BEST OF IT means ‘win’. ‘Gain advantage’ doesn’t.
    > AMMETER: obscurity without wordplay
    > The IO thing
    > ‘Fearsome disciplinarian’? Eh?
    > ORISON: pffft
    SALTIRE, ALGOL, REEVE, NEAT… I mean come on. I got there in the end, but it was like pulling teeth and I was surprised to get away with both BARRATRY and AMMETER without a pink square.
    In short, harrumph.

    Edited at 2020-06-04 04:24 pm (UTC)

  34. I liked it, except for Barratry, and got done in about 35 min, except for Barratry. Scottish Islands belong to the same circle of Hell as “plant”. I knew Io, learned from this that she was white, and much preferred her to “moon” or “satellite”. I liked Curio and the Reeve, Thanks to Z for helping me properly see the ‘probably’ in Children, and thanks setter
  35. Just over the half-hour, but with a typo not noticed before submitting. As FOI 10ac was MAKE THE MOST OF IT, it was difficult to get much of the top half.

  37. Didn’t know of BARRATRY and had to wait for the checkers. So I started at the bottom and worked up. A slow solve but very enjoyable. Loved the AMMETER clue once I’d seen it. ORISONS is indeed in Hamlet but also in Wilfred Owen’s “Anthem for Doomed Youth” …only the stuttering rifle’s rapid rattle can patter out their hasty orisons. (A memorable use of onomatopoeia beloved of all English teachers) 44 minutes. Ann
  38. Those who found Barra obscure clearly haven’t been watching anough Dad’s Army. Frazer often mentions it as a wild and lonely place, you understand.
  39. It took me a smidge under 27 mins to make a right pig’s ear of this one. I managed to get the unknown Algol and Barratry ok (assumed the latter was the crooked practice of flogging shoddily put together new-builds to first time buyers) but had ravelling at 1dn (I was following rjcassidy’s Rod Laver logic but ignoring the fact that I’d managed to swap the vowels around) and balastic instead of basaltic which I should’ve stopped to think about for a few more seconds.

    Blogger, I know from previous comments that you’ve been solving old Listener puzzles, I do the odd one that takes my fancy though mostly they’re over my head. I wondered if you’d gone as far back as 4560 Midsummer by Chalicea from June last year? One of those rare ones I was able to finish. Something reminded me of it today.

    1. I haven’t got that far back, but then I don’t have to do them in sequence! I’ll let you know!
    2. And I did, and yes I was able to finish too, and yes it does, doesn’t it!
      1. You seem to have cracked in less than 2 hours something that must’ve taken me the best part of a week. Bravo! I remember a lot of pleasure in the solving of that one and in seeing the finished grid once I’d worked it out.
        1. On the other hand, so far on this week’s I’ve got two clues in which may or may not be in the right place!
          It’s amazing how some Listeners stick in the mind, so that, for example, the relevant answer in this crossword took you back a full year. If you have the time, the Listener is both the most frustrating and the most satisfying of crosswords. I have no idea how some people manage all of them – even the numericals – but I do like to at least try.
          1. Successfully completing a listener gives me the same sense of achievement I felt on finishing my first ever Times cryptic. The best ones to my mind have a sort of beautiful crypticity in three-dimensions.

            If I see it’s a numerical one I won’t even read the rubric, I know it’ll be beyond me. Otherwise I’ll read the rubric, see if the terms are narrow enough that I am intellectually competent to operate within them, if I can find somewhere to get started and also if it piques my interest enough to sustain me for the long haul. So, like I say I am an infrequent tackler and even more infrequent successful solver of them, so it’s not too hard to remember the ones I did solve even if a full year has elapsed.

            I admire your commitment to the cause. Happy solving!

  40. Came to a complete halt on this then came back 3 days later and biffed lat 5 or 6 in without much problem. Strange how the mind works!

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