AZED CROSSWORD 1117

STAMNOS

1.  D. F. Manley: So Greek —— could indefinitely offer more songs, Keats? (comp. anag. & lit.; ref. ‘Ode to a Grecian Urn’).

2.  F. P. N. Lake: Old crock, such as may get stuck (not noted for power!) (stamps with no for P).

3.  M. Barley: Broken shards of this: might such not show Odysseus and Agamemnon? (anag. of first letters).

VHC

H. J. Bradbury: First appearing in Mycenae, some type of short necked amphora possibly? (anag. of first letters, & lit.).

E. J. Burge: Old crock’s sans MOT. Is that in order? Nope? (anag.).

G. & J. Ferris: Jar drunk on Samos: time for first drop of ouzo (anag. with t for o).

Dr I. S. Fletcher: Crock not the first to make SAS? (anag. incl. m, & lit.; make = arrive in sight of; SAS = Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries).

H. Freeman: First couplet omitted from Keats manuscript on ‘jar’… this? (anag. of (Ke)ats MS on, & lit.).

S. Goldie: Old crock indefinitely sans MOT (anag.).

R. R. Greenfield: Pitcher’s toss, looking stupid, gets man out, caught (anag. in anag.).

C. R. Gumbrell: Such, to be filled with what ends thirst, man fashioned back in Athens (t + anag. in so + s, & lit.).

R. Hesketh: The old pitcher from Minnesota’s giving up batting, and having no energy, stumbling (anag. less in, E).

R. J. Hooper: Ancient jar of Grecian 2000 (half defective) that ruined old Stan’s locks (M(M) in anag. incl. o; ref. hair preparation).

C. Loving: What’s a Greek urn? That’s the first bit of corn from Scotsman in variety (anag. less c).

R. K. Lumsdon: What’s a Greek urn? Ans:– most you’d define as well off (anag.).

R. C. Mallinson: Stone mason burst jar (st + anag.).

A. J. L. Neill: Scotsman, ploughing, lets go of cuddy’s head for a jar (anag. less c).

D. Pendrey: Old crock stupid Tam’s on loses tail only (anag. + s; ref. Burns, ‘Tam O’Shanter’).

M. Sanderson: Ancient container’s made of defective Samsonite – i.e. splits (anag. less i.e.).

D. Williamson: Randy Matson’s first Olympic throw might have produced this (anag.; ref. US shot-putter).

HC

E. A. Beaulah, J. R. Beresford, Mrs K. Bissett, Mrs F. A. Blanchard, C. J. & M. P. Butler, A. L. Dennis, V. Dixon, A. J. Dorn, C. M. Edmunds, L. E. Ellis, R. A. England, H. J. Godwin, G. I. L. Grafton, Mrs E. Greenaway, J. F. Grimshaw, P. F. Henderson, A. W. Hill, P. D. Hinchliffe, J. F. Jones, C. W. Laxton, J. W. Leonard, J. C. Leyland, J. D. Lockett, M. A. Macdonald-Cooper, D. J. Mackay, H. W. Massingham, J. R. C. Michie, C. G. Millin, D. Mitchell, T. J. Moorey, A. C. Morrison, C. J. Morse, R. S. Morse, K. O’Keeffe, F. R. Palmer, R. J. Palmer, R. Phillips, M. J. Pinches, Dr T. G. Powell, D. Price Jones, D. R. Robinson, N. Roper, R. Stocks, J. B. Sweeting, R. C. Teuton, A. J. Wardrop, G. Webb, R. J. Whale.
 

COMMENTS
302 entries and very few mistakes, though a few very respectable clues had to be disqualified because their authors failed to include a thematic word as instructed.
 
I must apologise most abjectly for my failure to include a definition in the clue to MONILIA, a lapse which I still can’t account for. And how a guan became a lizard is also a mystery -1 suspect a missing ‘tailless’. These awful mistakes by me don’t appear to have detracted too much from what most seemed to find an enjoyable if difficult ‘special’. A few of you said you assumed from my preamble that, because each of the theme-words in the puzzle contained a different trio of consecutive letters, I required in clues submitted a word containing a trio not used by me. I had anticipated this possibility and tried to word the instruction so as to indicate that any comparable word would do, without giving too much of the game away. I’m sorry if I didn’t make this crystal clear. In point of fact I thought I’d included all the possible three-letter combinations, but of course I hadn’t. ‘Afghan’ includes a further threesome. I had a lot of fun extending the list with hyphenated words (blanc-de-chine, top-quality), proper names (Dijkstra, Tuvalu), cyclical threesomes (coryza, zabaglioni) and abbreviations (KLM, SPQR), and wonder if anyone can think of others I’ve missed. One competitor drew my attention to what he believes are the only words in Chambers which include consecutive tetragrams, viz limnophilous and understudy. Can anyone add to these from any source?
 
Very few people failed to spot the theme. One competitor, rather perversely I thought, said yes he could see the three-letter sequences but where was the thematic link? Another found a reference to alcoholic beverages in each of the nine theme-words by ignoring certain letters and making anagrams of those remaining (e.g. BAC-CHI, genitive of BACCHUS, from DABCHICK). I would never inflict such tortuosity on you, believe me! My clue to REIS, however, was genuinely perplexing to many of you and I sympathise. I had always regarded ‘Iser, rolling rapidly’ as something of a crossword cliche (along with Inge, the ‘gloomy dean’ and a host of other hoary chestnuts), so I was hesitant about trotting it out again. In the event it was unknown to many and, because the quotation has been dropped by the current edition of ODQ, difficult to verify.
 
Clues submitted were in general less inspired than usual. Perhaps the word to be clued was to blame. Much the commonest idea involved a defective Greek vessel with no masts. Two further choices of wording deserve mention. A fair number included ‘not mass produced’ to indicate an anagram, to me a clear case of semantic overload. Another group included ‘sturdy’ to mean robust in the literal reading and giddy in the cryptic reading. The latter sense is clearly archaic, so to use the word as an anagram indicator without reference to this is to me quite unsound. Given that cryptic clue-writing is all about bending words and meanings to deceive the solver (if only temporarily), it is important to respect the limits beyond which this manipulation becomes wilful obscurantism.