Quick Cryptic Number 417 by Orpheus

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A brief blog due to lack of time this morning. I struggled to get into this one (1ac requiring all the checkers, and not seeing 3dn for the longest of times). Plenty to get your teeth stuck into!

Definitions underlined.

1 Boss given old-fashioned scarf to bind hair (10)
HEADSQUARE – HEAD (boss) and SQUARE (old-fashioned).
8 African city’s lapse leading to spillage of oil (7)
TRIPOLI – TRIP (lapse) and an anagram (spillage) of OIL.
9 Ancient British tribe’s choice nickname? Not entirely (5)
ICENI – hidden in (not entirely) choICE NIckname.
10 Genuine-sounding Scottish dance (4)
REEL – homophone of (sounding) “real” (genuine).
11 Nit-picking editor meeting worker in film (8)
PEDANTIC – ED (editor) with ANT (worker) in PIC (film).
13 Regret following a French team at first? Not so (6)
UNTRUE – RUE after UN (‘a’ in French) and T (first letter of team).
14 Extra supporter beside entrance to exhibition? (3,3)
LEG BYE – LEG (supporter), BY (beside) and E (first letter of exhibition).
17 Scottish festival always associated with chap minding pigs? (8)
HOGMANAY – AY (always) with HOGMAN (chap minding pigs?).
19 Summons from major ultimately involved in intelligence (4)
WRIT – last letter of majoR (ultimately) inside WIT (intelligence).
21 Employment America for example backed (5)
USAGE – USA (America) with EG (for example) turned backwards.
22 Student, fifty, one bringing in money (7)
LEARNER – L (learner, student) and EARNER (one bringing in money).
23 Touring City, relate to wavering voters (10)
ELECTORATE – anagram of (wavering) RELATE TO around EC (city).
2 In hospital department, most of film is clear (7)
EVIDENT – VIDEo (most of film) inside ENT (ear, nose and throat, hospital department).
3 Cross over, making entrance (4)
DOOR – ROOD (cross) turned over.
4 Tremble, seeing case for arrows (6)
QUIVER – double definition.
5 Lively arrangement for main date (8)
ANIMATED – anagram of (arrangement for) MAIN DATE.
6 Standing up straight before court (5)
ERECT – ERE (before) and CT (court).
7 Be elected as MP for NW city? Or one in Hants? (10)
WINCHESTER – WIN (be elected as MP for) CHESTER (NW city).
8 Reportedly disposed of — from one end to the other! (10)
THROUGHOUT – homophone of (reportedly) “threw out” (disposed of).
12 Woman accommodating Scandinavians and Africans (8)
SUDANESE – SUE (woman) taking in DANES (Scandinavians).
15 Titled man, one with little time to support pub (7)
BARONET – ONE and T (abbreviation for T) supporting BAR (pub).
16 Wager involving everyone in dance company (6)
BALLET – BET (wager) taking in ALL (everyone).
18 Easy elegance of good people (5)
GRACE – G (good) plus RACE (people).
20 Outdoor market of moderate quality (4)
FAIR – double definition.

13 comments on “Quick Cryptic Number 417 by Orpheus”

  1. Quick: Name 3 Scottish festivals. I can’t get past the one, which made 17ac rather easy; perhaps even in a Quickie the setter might have dropped the ‘Scottish’. (Or maybe there are a bunch of Scottish festivals I don’t know, of course.) There were a lot of old standby clues here–‘a French’=UN, ‘student’=L, ‘court’=CT, ‘worker’=ANT, ‘hospital department’=ENT,’time’=T, ‘good’=G, ‘city’=EC–making this rather a textbook example for newcomers to cryptics. Ironically, at 1ac I was expecting STUD for ‘boss’. LOI LEG BYE, since I know nothing of cricket, and have learned nothing about it over the years from all the zillions of crickety clues. 6:15.

    Edited at 2015-10-14 08:19 am (UTC)

    1. Burns Night, St Andrew’s Day, Wickerman, Up-Helly-aa… OK I cheated, I found the last 2 by looking up Scottish festivals. I did wonder fleetingly, though, if this might be the name of some Highland Games other than Braemar. But I remembered Hogmanay soon enough. Only minor hold-up was at 23a trying to make a word out of CITY RELATE to mean ‘wavering voters’. 14a my LOI – I should have been expecting a cricket clue with a test match on, even if it has no specatators. COD to 8d.

  3. I only got half-way through this one, perhaps I was a bit slow today and gave up too early!
    I struggled with a lot of the parsing, ‘square’ for ‘oldfashioned’, ‘ay’ for always,’ec’ for example, and 7D, 8D and 12D were just too difficult. I also missed the indicators in 9A and 23A. Perhaps I would have done better if I had got just a few more checkers.
    By the way, isn’t the ‘L’ in 22A from the Latin numeral for 50?

    Brian

  4. Wrote in Rood for 3d instead of the definition, which bu**ered up my 1ac. Gave up in the end. Stupid, had been doing well this week.
    1. Postal districts in the City of London begin with EC standing I believe for East Central. It’s a crossword cliché so is worth remembering.

      Edited at 2015-10-14 09:59 am (UTC)

  6. Most of this was ok, but took ages to get my last two: 7d and 8d. Bit slow with 14ac as well. Invariant
  7. I found this quite tricky, but got there in the end with my last 2 in being 1a and 3d (which I chucked in unparsed as I’d not heard of Rood before). COD was 7d.
  8. My first completed (without aids) in a couple of weeks. I spent too long on 5d thinking it was a musical instruction. 14a nearly fooled me. Very enjoyable.
  9. I thought this a fair and enjoyable puzzle. Growing confidence led me down some blind alleys early on:Nairobi fitted for 8a and 7d took me to Manchester then to Dorchester until I parsed it correctly. My last in was 14a (once again stumped by a cricket clue) and my favourites were 14a and 8d. David

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