Times Cryptic 27278

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

I forgot to note my finishing time but, whilst not finding this puzzle exactly easy, I didn’t have too many problems and would estimate I spent between half-an-hour and 45 minutes on it. There seems to be a bit of a French influence going on.

As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]

Across
1 Brahmins may fear to act so, else condemned (4,5)
LOSE CASTE – Anagram [condemned] of ACT SO ELSE. Nuff said.
6 Departs with boss on elephant (5)
DUMBO – D (departs – train timetables etc), UMBO (boss – on a shield). The flying elephant in the 1941 Walt Disney cartoon.
9 Loving and giving boy presumably provides a thrill (7)
FRISSON – FRI’S SON (boy). This refers to the traditional rhyme about the characteristics of children born on different days of the week in which ‘Friday’s child is loving and giving’.
10 Share values — play this flirtatiously (7)
FOOTSIE – Two definitions of sorts, the first with reference to the ‘Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 Index’ known informally as ‘The Footsie’
11 Variety of fruit, the first to drop (5)
RANGE – {o}RANGE (fruit) [the first to drop]
12 Intriguing team with new role for foreign gentleman (9)
CABALLERO – CABAL (intriguing team), anagram [new] of ROLE
14 Slippery surface to kill American (3)
ICE – Two meanings with ‘American’ indicating where the second one originated
15 Girl survived eating husks of rice and chicken (4-7)
LILY-LIVERED – LILY (girl), LIVED (survived} containing [eating] R{ic}E [husks]. Two slang terms describing a coward.
17 Refuse to admit one has small confidence in expert group (6,5)
BRAINS TRUST – BRAN (refuse – more husks, left-overs from grinding grain) containing [to admit] I (one), S (small), TRUST (confidence). ‘Refuse = bran’ makes change from ‘marc’.
19 Garment causing no end of rage? (3)
FUR – FUR{y} (rage) [no end]
20 Go and be rude to a lord in speech (9)
DISAPPEAR – DIS (be rude to), A, PEAR in this context sounds like [in speech] PEER (lord)
22 Spoke fondly of nothing in school (5)
COOED – 0 (nothing) contained by [in] CO-ED (school). We seem to have had a lot of billing-and-cooing here recently.
24 Say, T E again in a desert (7)
ARABIST – BIS (again – encore!) contained by [in] A+RAT (desert). Thomas Edward Lawrence (of Arabia). SOED has Arabist (among other things) as:  (a) an expert in or student of the Arabic language or other aspects of Arab culture; (b) a supporter of Arabism.
26 Not proprietary dope? Fine (7)
GENERIC – GEN (dope), ERIC (fine). SOED has: eric – Irish history. A blood fine or financial compensation which had to be paid by a murderer to the family or dependants of the victim. I didn’t know that.
27 Great weight of gold falling off back of car (5)
TONNE – TONNE{au} (back of a car), [gold  – AU – falling off]. A feature mostly of vintage cars.
28 Achieve reversal of revolutionary loss of rights (9)
ATTAINDER – ATTAIN (achieve), RED (revolutionary) reversed. Another legal term which thankfully has come up before.
Down
1 Second drink shortly brought up for prisoner (5)
LIFER – REFIL{l} (second drink) [shortly] reversed [brought up]
2 Seeing nothing wrong in being smart (7)
SOIGNEE – Anagram [wrong] of SEEING 0 (nothing). Meticulously dressed, prepared, or arranged; well-groomed. The double ‘e’ makes it feminine.
3 Keep manager, outstanding almost to the end, in prison (9)
CASTELLAN – STELLA{r} (outstanding) [almost to the end] contained by [in] CAN (prison). ‘Keep’ as in part of a castle.
4 Revolutionary state consul sacked (4-7)
SANS-CULOTTE – Anagram [sacked] of STATE CONSUL. More from SOED: a lower-class Parisian republican in the French Revolution; gen. an extreme republican or revolutionary.
5 Fairy’s personality not singular (3)
ELF – {s}ELF (fairy) [not singular] “An elf is a supernatural being; sometimes they’re invisible like fairies“
6 Master sent north to arrest old slaver (5)
DROOL – LORD (master) containing [to arrest] O (old) reversed [sent north]
7 Sums are wrong: rubber found (7)
MASSEUR – Anagram [wrong] of SUMS ARE
8 Clear command closed ranks? On the contrary (4,5)
OPEN ORDER – OPEN and ORDER are to be read as opposites [on the contrary] of ‘closed’ and ranks’. I think we may have singular / plural conflict in the second one.
13 In alert mode after escape, honest! (4,7)
BOLT UPRIGHT – BOLT  (escape), UPRIGHT (honest)
14 Shortly ordered to interrupt home leave, taken so amiss? (2,3,4)
IN BAD PART – IN (home), BAD{e} (ordered) [shortly], PART (leave)
16 Council tax roughly broken finally into three (7,2)
VATICAN II – VAT (tax), CA (roughly) + {broke}N [finally] contained by [into] III (three)
18 Don’t put an X: it’s a black mark (7)
ABSTAIN – A, B (black), STAIN (mark)
19 Evidence of leak keeps engineers stumped (7)
FLOORED – FLOOD (evidence of leak) contains [keeps] RE (engineers)
21 Best school book, almost (5)
PRIME – PRIME{r} (school book) [almost]
23 Colour scheme etc used in wide corridor (5)
DECOR – Hidden in {wi}DE COR{ridor}
25 Duck out of large bush (3)
TEA – TEA{l} (duck) [out of large]

63 comments on “Times Cryptic 27278”

  1. Quite a struggle – well over an hour if I’d finished – but finally stumped by ARABIST and consequently TEA. NHO BIS = again. Another latin thing? I liked DROOL.
  2. Great puzzle – solved it in a leisurely fashion, savouring each clue, so no time to record. Liked the French feel (being a French teacher I guess I would say that). I vaguely remember reading somewhere that SOIGNEE appeared years ago in the champs and that Magoo really liked the clue, which was something to do with a signee, I think. Nice blog, jack.

    Edited at 2019-02-19 09:30 pm (UTC)

  3. 1 hr 2 mins here. Felt well off the pace. Lose caste not known as a phrase, couldn’t parse the Fridays child bit of 9ac. Dnk or had forgotten Eric and tonneau. Slow to see how soignee worked, another unfamiliar word there too. Castellan and sans-culotte also a bit off-piste for me. As for Vatican II, I haven’t even seen the first film let alone the sequel. What was the tagline? ….this time it’s pastoral? FOI 10ac. Spent ages over Arabist hence LOI 25dn. A stretching puzzle and enjoyable in that way.
    1. You’d have struggled to see Vatican I, it was a bit early for movies: The First Vatican Council (Latin: Concilium Vaticanum Primum) was convoked by Pope Pius IX on 29 June 1868, after a period of planning and preparation that began on 6 December 1864:-)
      1. It took Pope Pius IX three and a half years to organise a meeting? Well I suppose no one’s infallible. : – D
  5. I gave up on this. I don’t mind obscurity but I like to have some fun. VATICAN II? My response is unprintable.

    Edited at 2019-02-19 10:13 pm (UTC)

  6. There used to be (maybe still is) a Spanish liqueur called Ponce Caballero which I never had the courage to order.
    Toughie today with some new words to instantly forget.

    Edited at 2019-02-19 10:47 pm (UTC)

  7. Beaten by ARABIST and PRIME. Oh, and also by VATICAN II; the closest I got was “vatican pi”, on the vague grounds that a value of pi=3 might be some sort of papal declaration.

    Edited at 2019-02-20 12:13 am (UTC)

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