Times 24713 – Vocabulary test today!

Author   vinyl1Posted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 45 minutes

Music: Ravel, Daphnis and Chloe, Monteux/LSO

This was a bit on the challenging side, requiring good general knowledge and some tricky clue parsing. There are some easy clues that let you get started, but you won’t be finishing unless you know a few uncommon words.

There are a couple of points I am still not quite sure of, although I think my solution is correct. It may be that the clue is a bit UK-centric, or maybe I just don’t see it. As always, your comments are welcome.

If you are surprised that I am up today, my Monday associate Kororareka is off at a conference. He will be back next week to blog what he hopes is not too difficult an offering. We shall see.

Across
1 PINETUM, PINE + [s]TUM[p]. My first in, and even if you don’t know the word, the cryptic should point the way for you.
5 CLAMS UP, CLAM S[o]UP. Put in at once from the definition, as soon as I had the first letter.
9 GERMANIUM, GER(M[iniaturisation])ANIUM. I’ve seen this before, and was not fooled.
10 YOBBO, [h]OBBY backwards with O[ld] inserted. I wasted a lot of time trying to work in ‘booby’, but in the end it proved helpful because the correct answer had similar letters.
11 ACHES AND PAINS, anagram of A SPANISH DANCE. An apt anagram, but the last word is a simple anagram of ‘Spain’, so you are likely to be thinking along the right lines.
13 DRAGOMAN, DRAGO(M.A.)N. This may be difficult if you have never seen the word, although probably doable.
15 MOWGLI, MOW + G[ir]L + I. I have heard of him, although I have never read Kipling. They did have Classic Comics when I was a wee lad, fifty years ago.
17 ENAMEL, backward hidden word in [har]LEM A NE[w]. The clue provides more of a nudge than a good clue should.
19 STEENBOK, anagram of KNEE’S TO B[e]. An obscure beast and a tricky clue, this one may prove elusive. I thought it was only a partial anagram through most of my solve, but the penny finally dropped when I got the crossing letters.
22 TIME CONSUMING, double definition, one jocular. I found this quite hard, not knowing what to make of the clue.
25 Omitted, use the crossing letters and ping us if you’re still stuck.
26 ESCAMILLO, ESC + A MILL + O. Another character you may not have heard of, although the clue points strongly towards the plot of Carmen. I am getting wise to the computer keys the setters like to use, the other one being ‘alt’.
27 REARMED, REAR + MED. Stock elements in a somewhat novel arrangement.
28 NAIL SET, NAILS + E[mbezzlemen]T. Very smooth deceptive surface, fine clue.
 
Down
1 Omitted, use the crossing letters, this should be easy
2 NIRVANA, VAN in anagram of IRAN. Not immediately obvious to me, but it should have been.
3 TRASH, T[ime] + RASH. Another fine surface reading that makes the clue a bit difficult to parse.
4 MAINSTAY, MAINS + TAY. ‘Mains’ is a UK term, and the Tay is a Scottish river, so overseas solvers may have to think a bit.
5 CEMENT, C[rat]E + ME[a]NT, where ‘to conceal a’ means ‘take out the A’, and the literal is simply ‘binder’.
6 ASYMPTOTE, A(SYMPTO[m])TE. My last in, really quite difficult. I knew where I was going, but had to work through all the signs of the zodiac first before trying other meanings of ‘sign’. Not a word that comes up much in conversation,
either.
7 SIBLING, IS upwards + BLING. Should be easy for most solvers.
8 POOH STICKS, HOOP backwards + STICKS. George has nailed it, I wasted all my agonising over the wrong element of this answer, being mislead by the bridge that is used on the pool table.POOL STICKS, LOOP backwards + STICKS. I think this must be the answer, since it fits the cryptic. I interpret ‘sticks’ as ‘stick-in-the-muds’, i.e. bores. It is the literal I can’t quite place, and Google is not much help. I could very well be wrong on this one, but I don’t see what other word would fit the second element and make sense.
12 ADVENTURER, ADVENT + URE + R. Another starter clue for you.
14 OPERCULUM, anagram of RUM COUPLE. This is far from a starter clue, I had to scour my brain for this word. It is not what I thought it was, either, but at least I got the answer right.
16 ETRUSCAN, TRUE SCAN with the ‘E’ moved to the front. This language often appears, but we are still waiting for Oscan.
18 ARMENIA, AR(MEN)IA. I carelessly put in ‘Austria’, but saw my error almost at once. Trying to be a speed solver just slows me down.
20 BIGGLES, BIG + anagram of LEGS. I had no idea he was a pilot, so just went with the cryptic.
21 UNDEAD, UNDE[r] + A[wkwar]D. An excellent clue, with a good surface and fresh wordplay.
23 IAMBI, BAMBI with a different first letter. I do not like the clues where one letter is just changed arbitrarily, they are a bit too loose for my taste.
24 MOOT, MOO + T[emperature]. Used as a verb, where the definition is ‘to raise for discussion’.

38 comments on “Times 24713 – Vocabulary test today!”

  1. 15 minutes, and relieved to see that we agree, because there was a lot here that came from the wordplay, thankfully crystal clear except for the anagram at 14 (as usual, I was expecting to find OREUCPLUM was a word).

    Needed wordplay to get PINETUM, SCAMILLO, OPERCULUM and NAIL SET.

    Vinyl, I think 8 down is POOH STICKS from the A.A. Milne stories (I put it in from definition, but it fits your wordplay with HOOP instead of LOOP).

    Also in without complete understanding ASYMPTOTE (a word I do use regularly) and YOBBO.

  2. ESCAMILLO raised a smile. When I sang a version of the Toreador Song at school, my dislike of operatic translations was sown when forced to sing “Here come the matadors in all their glory; soon the angry bull will be gory”. Here’s Ruggero Raimond as Escamillo in the 1984 film version (in the original French) of Carmen.

    Back to the crossword, as Vinyl points out, a lot of tricky stuff to go with the gimmes. NAIL SET was a guess (my DIY skills are dismal) as were STEENBOK, DRAGOMAN, GERMANIUM and ASYMPTOTE. Ran out of steam in the NW corner, getting fixated on ‘yen’ for long (somehow, ‘pine’ must have seemed unlikely as a result of having conifer elsewhere in the clue), before trying to justify ‘lengthy’ – not for ‘long’, though. Also needed to resort to aids for the clever MAINSTAY; after all of which, I finished with PAGE. COD to CLAMS UP. Very tasty.

  3. Quite tricky for a Monday. 53 minutes with one silly mistake: DRAGOBAN at 13ac. Male solvers of a certain age will probably know that the hobby’s Latin name is subbuteo, as in the table football game (and the Undertones song My Perfect Cousin).
  4. About an hour in two sessions, with guesses for an unusually large number of unknown and almost unknown words which, thanks to precise cluing and a bit to my surprise, all turned out to be correct.
  5. Something under 40 minutes, but I put in ‘pool sticks’, too, out of desperation, and impatience–it was my last to go in, and I wanted to get the damn thing done.
    I agree about Bambi/iambi type clues in general, but ‘animated creature’ seemed to me specific enough that I didn’t mind.
  6. A rather tricky and very entertaining puzzle which should go some way to dispelling the myth that Monday puzzles are easy!

    Everything except PINETUM was known (if not exactly familiar), perhaps from years of doing barred crosswords. Apart from 23 where I agree with Vinyl1’s comment I liked the clues of the short words especially TRASH and MOOT.

    Pieman

  7. I had to sidestep the leaderboard today, as I gave in and turned to aids when I had five left after about 15 minutes. Once I had Escamillo (didn’t know) and Etruscan (couldn’t think of) the others (nail set, steenbok, pooh sticks) followed fairly quickly, and I kicked myself soundly for each one.
  8. Disappointing. After a reasonable start I ground to a halt with about a third of the grid completed but got second wind and really thought I was going to crack it without aids after all. But after an hour I resorted to a dictionary to find ASYMPTOTE and used a solver to look for an alternative to NAME SET at 28 which I knew must be wrong. Then with all the correct checking letters in place IAMBI at 23 became obvious.

    There was rather too much technical stuff today for my poor brain but I also struggled with the name of the toreador at 26 which should have gone in very much earlier as I had spotted the reference to Carmen immediately on first reading.

  9. If only I’d known that NAIL SET was a nail punch! One of the possibilties that I’d considered but rejected, thinking it probably referred (if it existed) to a set of false nails. Dependent on wordplay for ESCAMILLO and cheating for ASYMPTOTE and OPERCULUM. Still not sure why ‘ate’ = ‘worried’ in ‘asymptote’ clue.
      1. Thanks for elucidation. Now seems obvious – as do so many things when I come here to check my stumbling efforts against those of my betters!
  10. 12:10, so another fairly chewy Monday puzzle – finished off with all the stuff that Vinyl mostly found easy in the NW, though we agreed on the difficulty of achieving Nirvana.

    I can understand the grumble about unspecified letter replacements, but would like to suggest a couple of mitigating circumstances in this case: First, the letter concerned is checked. Second, if you’re going to replace the B in Bambi and finish up with a real word, there seems to be only one possible choice. I have no idea whether the Times crossword editor takes either of these into account.

  11. I thought this was rather tenacious for a monday. Lots of vocab, as the blogger suggests, held me back to 17 minutes. There was something about bridge, but I’m not even going there today. Peace.
  12. I found this a very tough start to the week: 54 minutes in total.
    There is an unusual amount of tricky vocabulary in here: PINETUM, GERMANIUM, HOBBY, DRAGOMAN, STEENBOK, ESCAMILLO, NAIL SET, ASYMPTOTE, OPERCULUM, IAMBI. Some of it I knew, some of it I didn’t, but there must be something in here to trip up most people I’d have thought. Fortunately the wordplay was clear (if tricky in places) and I was relieved and surprised to find I hadn’t made any mistakes.
    ESCAMILLO was a frustrating presence throughout my solve because I got the Carmen reference immediately but couldn’t remember his name.
  13. 20 minutes, so on the tricky side, partly because the NW did not yield with any alacrity. Lots of unknowns and barely knowns: OPERCULUM ans ASYMPTOTE are the kind of words you only known about from crosswords (and on a really good edition, Countdown) without having to know what they mean. NAIL SET was also not known in this form. My daughter sometimes puts one on her fingers.
    POOH-STICKS I have played many a happy time – living in Bourton-on-the-Water helped, where there were many appropriate bridges. For memory’s sake, it’s my CoD
  14. I was on the setter’s wavelength today and sailed through this in 20 minutes. Delighted to see the mathematical term ASYMPTOTE which I was able to solve direct from the definition. In the main the dearth of scientists and scientific terms used in the Times continues much as before so we must be grateful for these small crumbs of comfort.

    There’s some very good cluing here because the obscurities can be derived from wordplay. I even knew the literary and operatic characters – it made up a little for golf being frozen off yet again.

  15. 29 minutes. A good start to the week. Liked the Spanish dance, the lunch break, the chowder and the top bunk, but favourite today must be the bridge game.
  16. I was pleased to finish this without aids. I knew ASYMPTOTE was a word but had no idea what it meant. Fortunately the word play and the crossing letters made it clear. I’ve never heard of NAIL SET before but having S-T as the second word was a bit of a giveaway. Spotted the toreador straight away – which helped with the SE corner. A good workout for a Monday morning – a very enjoyable 39 minutes.
  17. Likewise very pleased to finish without aids in 49 minutes. All the unusual words have been mentioned already..well done setter!
  18. 11:28 here, so I must have been on the right wavelength this morning. I didn’t know ESCAMILLO, STEENBOK or OPERCULUM, but all were readily gettable from the wordplay.
  19. About 30 minutes to finish this in two sessions but one mistake – POOL STICKS. Also had a bit of trouble with 23 as I wanted to change the illogical LAMBS to IAMBS. OPERCULUM and ,last in, ASYMPTOTE were unknown and also found a lot of the clues quite tough.
  20. Needed my brain firmly in gear for this one, and after two late nights following the cricket, it definitely was not.

    The result was an abject failure on my part. Well over two hours with much use of aids to get all the words I didn’t know, which almost seemed to outnumber the familiar ones.

    Well blogged Jonathan – I’m very grateful it wasn’t my turn.

  21. Had same problems as many others (always reassuring to find I’m not totally alone…). Great blog, with clear explanations, lots of unfamiliar vocab, and some more new ‘crossword lingo’ to take on board (ATE, VAN…). I found it as vinyl said, a crossword of two parts with some relatively easy clues giving one an early sense of achievement, only to be thwarted by words I had not come across, hidden through tricky word play. I too had POOL STICKS, and kicked myself to see the correct version. CoD to TIME CONSUMING.
  22. Occasional Times solver but appreciated the precision to correctly guess the unfamiliar words, and the beautiful surface readings. Well done to setter and editor alike & thanks for the blog. I hadn’t heard of Nail Set before clue 8a in Friday’s Telegraph Toughie 470 by Elgar (John Henderson, also an anonymous Times setter – see Big Dave’s site for his clue there) and had always called it a Nail Punch or (incorrectly) a Centre Punch (which is similar and can do the job, but it’s not the same thing). John Henderson is one of 4 setters called John who set jointly in the Guardian under the pseudonym Biggles (20d), a character created by W.E. Johns (as in “we Johns”). Coincidence? Yeah, probably!
    Yours untruly, Erich von Stalhein.
  24. About an hour before resorting to aids for DRAGOMAN and OPERCULUM, which haven’t made it into my vocabulary. I believe I saw the former in one of these puzzles with a meaning similar to ‘advisor’, but I couldn’t dredge it up. The latter I’ve never seen anywhere, being ignorant about all but the most well known parts of fish – even though I saw the anagram, I couldn’t piece it together. And, I went for the LOOP STICKS too, so I was soundly thrashed today. Still, I’m pleased I got the rest of them! Well done setter, even if some are a tad obscure. Regards to all.
  25. Probably a little over an hour – stymied by a few and relieved to get there in the end. COD Page: the kind of simplicity that appeals.
  26. Found this very hard. Not helped by being sure that 23dn was Dumbo/jumbo and of course not being able to make it work. And had never heard of OPERCULUM.

    1dn is omitted, so the answer is presumably PAGE, since to page someone is to call them, but what’s all that stuff about seeking a knighthood? And 22ac I can’t understand either: OK it’s taking too long, but lunch?

    1. Page was the first stage in becoming a knight; then (at 14?) one became a squire, then a knight. A lunch break is time (spent) consuming.
  27. Very late comment, as usual, but I’ve only just not finished, and incorrectly, as well, having POOL SHARKS rather than POOH STICKS. The one I didn’t get was MOWGLI, the only Kipling character I can remember offhand (having read The Jungle Book as a child, so a VERY long time ago). But I was looking for YG (heartless young) inside a lady + A, i.e., ?OYG?A, and of course not finding it. Got NAIL SET only with help, and before that the last in were TIME CONSUMING, IAMBI and ESCAMILLO (this only from the word play). All in all a considerable disaster. Well, now to start TODAY’s puzzle…
  28. Biggles today, Johns clued from memory as “children’s author” yesterday or the day before. Is this a whimsical Times policy, related clues on nearby days?

    It’s been noted by others before on this blog, and I’ve noticed a few others over the years that weren’t commented on here.

    Rob

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