The Hardest Times Crossword In Months

[@no-feetmcgee5577]

"Anthony adverse" is when Simon thinks Mark has sent him a puzzle as a prank.

[@TiagoMorbusSa]

Simon: "I'm sure most of you have already gotten this" Me: didn't get a single one

[@Wecoc1]

"Don't be misled by thoughts of exotic lacy lingerie... you have to think of tops" That isn't helping, Simon 😆

[@Christopher0601]

I love the sudoku content, but oh man I wish we got more frequent crosswords -- they're so fun to watch. Nice job simon :)

[@rubix4716]

1D is COVE + RAGE for the wordplay. Just like road rage is a driving incident, COVE RAGE might a sailing incident.

[@TheMeanAdmin]

That was the only wordplay I got before Simon did. After he helpfully solved it, of course.

[@ericcork34]

Cave Canem is quite famous as it was found on a mosaic in the ruins of Pompeii.

[@highpath4776]

cave benedict from some kind of public school I think comes to mind

[@kf6eml]

Cave canem! Beware of the dog!

[@KeplersDream]

Cave Canem was the only one I actually got 😄

[@Rob-ew9id]

It never ceases to amaze me how Simon solves these puzzles that I can hardly get anywhere with, but then needs five minutes to work out why "side with monarch" can mean heads. Instantaneous for me and I can hardly do cryptics at all.

[@emilywilliams3237]

Me too - and I only "do" cryptics by watching Simon and Mark do them.

[@EkuuleusNorth]

There must be something in that. I'm awful at cryptic, yet I got side with Monarch instantly too.

[@ConManAU]

Sometimes it helps that you’re not familiar with so many cryptic tricks because you don’t get misdirected.

[@kevevev]

Love when you delve back into cryptic crosswords, thanks for showcasing this Simon. Fiendishly dfficult!

[@davidrattner9]

Thank you so much Simon for releasing this bonus video for us!! Your solves of cryptic crosswords and how you take the time to fully explain each answer is masterclass!!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Totally agree!

[@Dysiode]

You make it so easy to follow along, I felt so smart just recognizing what you were explaining!

[@skymotel2]

Simon, I love watching you solve cryptic crosswords... I am useless with words and just love the odd time that I get just one clue before you. It happens in one video in four.... Please do more.❤

[@emilywilliams3237]

I don't get why, entirely, but only on that last word, HEADSTAY, I knew immediately that "side with monarch" was the opposite of tails on a coin. But in a way, that is a tribute to you and Mark who have taught me to think out of my usual pathway when reading cryptic crossword clues. Now, maybe in another 10 years I will be able to do one or two clues all by myself. (And no I did not get cross with you in the slightest ...) Thanks for this bonus content, always love the crosswords.

[@th.nd.r]

INCREDIBLE! Gosh this must take a month to set, ya know? Such incredible clues all around. Well solved!

[@howardwilde]

Thanks for doing crossword content! Also, kudos to the setter (!) for a stupendous puzzle. Truly beautiful clues, and one of the best regular cryptics I've seen in ages.

[@mjkluck]

Always like watching these solves. Wish more were posted.

[@Ruddigore]

More, more, more..... I live for Cryptic Crosswords. It's why I joined CTC way back when.

[@grenvillephillips6998]

I always enjoy these because I treat them as a lesson in "crossword" thinking, which I often find is difficult to maintain.

[@michaellott3575]

Simon, absolutely no consolation but I got stuck on those 2 clues as well; a most artful compiler. And yes more videos like this one please.

[@peterdunlop7691]

Thank you for giving me almost an hour of incredible entertainment.

[@deaneshort4111]

Great effort Simon. I tried this on the day and never did get HEADSTAY. Presume the last comment was something to do with the Magpie’s 20th anniversary. Would love to see more advanced cryptic content on here. Love Magpie btw. Thanks to you and Mark for starting it (and the rest of the editorial team)

[@MrBigrig5]

Thank goodness this was posted… tried to take a stab at it earlier today and thought it was monstrous. Well done Simon!!!

[@nickburton5871]

I managed about a third of them, but I did get the last 2 you struggled with, which gave me a most uncharitable level of pleasure! Having learned Latin years ago it's nice to have a use for it at last, and living afloat I scanned 16d. differently. Feeling very smug! Thank you so much for the extra video today!

[@RikusNel]

Cove rage... Raging pirate at the cove..

[@maxstunner100]

Awesome! Please can you do more cryptic crosswords. 😊

[@sssoleil]

Literally the only clue I got before Simon was the last clue that stumped him. That's how it goes.

[@hoofa2000]

That was glorious. Watching your pains on HEADS was so funny. I was hanging for that lightbulb moment. More Crosswords please. One per week maybe?

[@LexicographicalPedant]

Somehow, in a rare stroke of luck, I did get the cave canem clue from a deep dive into latin I had 6 years ago, triggered by a QI episode

[@FullazInTheHood]

“Be not misled with thoughts in your head of exotic lacy lingerie.” Ahhh… now I know why I have never been able to solve a cryptic😂😂😂

[@GordonjSmith1]

Really enjoyed it, rather peculiarly for me the two clues you stumbled on I got quite quickly (but not much of the rest). However I did study Latin a little, and love sailing! More like this please ! So engaging to watch.

[@phyphor]

Nice to see my friend Matthew getting yet another shout out! And nice to see you doing an incredibly tough cryptic with great skill and finesse!

[@timotab]

*waves* why am I not surprised to see you here? :)

[@Dysiode]

"Cove rage" is really clever

[@Teverell]

1A is a simply genius bit of word-play... 'would you mind' = watch out, beware = cave (in Latin). 'The setter, maybe' - a setter is a type of dog (The 'maybe' indicates it's a dog, doesn't have to be any particular breed). 'using Latin' - 'beware of the dog' in Latin is 'cave canem'. Absolutely genius.... and very very hard if you don't know any Latin. Definitely one of the more common Latin expressions and one well worth remembering in the future!!

[@TweedleDean]

I never studied Latin but I've known one across ever since seeing a mosaic from ancient Rome in my local museum with that phrase on it. ;) Always love these puzzles and am always surprised when I get a few of them right!

[@andrewjanssen8663]

Once there were a few letters in 1 Across, I was reading “mind the setter” as “beware the dog”, not as anything to do with the puzzle setter.

[@barneytrubble]

I was happy to get butterfly (from the letters Simon had already provided), as that was the only clue I managed to get

[@ThePlebicide]

I got to Heads as in coin a bit before Simon, which makes me happy. Anthony Adverse is a book and film, I had never heard of. It won an Oscar apparently.

[@stephenjames2951]

Waiting in anticipation for when Simon gets ‘side with a monarch’ was hilarious

[@inwalters]

Yes. Gale Sondergaard won the very first Best Supporting Actress Oscar and it was the third movie role for Dame Olivia de Havilland.

[@Stephen-Fox]

Always enjoy a cryptic crossword video.

[@elLooto]

In construction a stay is a support that stops something tall and thin (like a wall or a post) from falling over during construction

[@highpath4776]

I think boiler stays, mostly railway locomotive, to keep the walls of the pressure vessel expanding or falling in on themselves.

[@bobblebardsley]

If the only mistake you make is a single incorrect vowel in an answer that isn't even in English, I don't think you can feel too bad about that 👍

[@nendwr]

Anthony Adverse is one of those extremely long, confusing historical dramas that cinematographers could get away with in the 1930s. Orphan has Sliding Doors moment with beloved and goes off to Africa to make money in the slave trade sort of thing. Different times...

[@purplezart]

the end of this puzzle turns out to be a real cointoss! XD

[@peterjongsma2779]

If Simon didn't have to explain it to us, I'm sure he'd be the quickest solver. Except for the last clue , because he's too stubborn to use Chambers Dictionary.

[@inwalters]

42:29 - "Beware of the Dog" always reminds me of the famous Roald Dahl World War II short story of that name, which was adopted into the James Garner movie '36 hours". No spoilers, so you'll have to go read it yourself.

[@ChrisProfrock]

21:30 I also think a "Mark of Democracy" could be seen as Taxes.

[@bibliopolist]

A very good solve, especially as I actually got two way earlier than Simon did (usually I get none at all, not being anative speaker): Cave Canem (yes, I did take Latin, but am proud to have spotted the setter) and "headstay" (with the right idea as to how the clue worked well). Was putting Anthony in the description maybe a prank? I loved that part. Still I don't see why that novel should be a "historic work" at all.

[@martinwilson5210]

Enjoyed it very much, doubt I would ever have solved it.

[@longwaytotipperary]

Yes please - tell us about your venture with Mark before CTC!! ❤

[@Anne_Mahoney]

The Magpie, I assume?

[@lovelifetothefull1]

Simon, got “Headstay” 15 seconds before you did😊. Excellent work. Well done.

[@zachpekarsky6905]

I don't know what you're planning exactly, but just the thought of magpie content is getting me excited

[@LandOfForeverSummer]

Always enjoy these videos

[@longwaytotipperary]

Lovely surprise this morning!

[@davidrattner9]

Absolutely gorgeous to have this to get your day going!!!

[@Shif80]

Hearing Simon say “side with monarch” over and over…..

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Simon, you keep meowing that you don't have any Latin. Well, I teach Latin (among other things), so here are a couple of pointers. Tore Janson, "A Natural History of Latin" (Oxford, 2007), is a good overview of how the language works and where it comes from, with some basic grammar and vocabulary thrown in. Coulter George, "How Dead Languages Work" (Oxford, 2020), covers Latin as well as Greek, Sanskrit, Old English, and more, with less grammatical detail but more literature; I assign this to first-year university students. Frederick Bodmer, "The Loom of Language" (London, 1944, with many reprints), is designed for the intelligent adult who wants to pick up a bit of one or more modern European languages, and also explains Latin in some detail. Or just take the Wikipedia "List of Latin phrases (full)" and browse that until some of the common ones stick in your head 😸 As for the phrase in the puzzle, it's properly pronounced "KAA-way KAA-nem" (but the "way" part shouldn't be a diphthong). Cave is from the verb caveo, cavere, meaning to beware of something, fear it, look out for it. Canem is the direct object form of the noun canis, meaning a dog (from which we get canine). Singular direct objects often end in -m but the previous vowel depends on which kind of noun it is: feminam, woman (A noun); lupum, wolf (O noun); mulierem, woman (consonant noun); exercitum, army (U noun); rem, thing (E noun). You'd written canum at first, but that would be the possessive plural, like dogs' in English. Latin can be lots of fun: don't hesitate to jump in and start playing with it!

[@razercore7591]

My mind just does not work like this. I've never gotten a single one in any of these crossword puzzles that you do. I actually watch these videos because they're relaxing even though I can't get any of the answers. XD

[@kutludenizilgaz2175]

Anthony Adverse is a historical novel set in the Napoleonic era and spans three continents

[@markbennet9058]

What a brilliant puzzle

[@RiseofPerfection]

49:11 Yeah, Simon, you could say we want some cross words with you! ..i‘ll let myself out thanks. Awesome solve though. For me almost all clues were utter gibberish

[@bluerizlagirl]

I was screaming at Simon about 16D! He even had the right answer earlier, but didn't bother to try to reverse-engineer the wordplay from the answer!

[@mitrisharaiha8916]

I love these cryptic crosswords

[@lizzyvv447]

I was inspired by one of your videos a while ago to come up with a few cryptic clues myself. Here is one I'm quite proud of: Minute or second? Strange outside inquiry. (4) But let's just say I'll mainly stick with sudokus, cuz most of this cryptic stuff is way beyond me....

[@longwaytotipperary]

What is the answer?

[@lizzyvv447]

@@longwaytotipperary tiny

[@longwaytotipperary]

I understand “outside inquiry” = “iy”. How does “Strange” = “tn?”

[@lizzyvv447]

@@longwaytotipperary Minute = second strange + outside inquiry; T iny

[@longwaytotipperary]

@@lizzyvv447 ah - the “?” was camouflage.

[@Enkil01]

Yah! Love the crossword videos wish there was more. I thought of that last clue headstay, as i thought it meant 'side with Monarch' stay with the head eg stay with king. Never got the coin connection, so think was lucky. Think headstay is something to do with sailing.

[@Mujaki]

For 9 across, the "king" abbreviation could also be from playing cards. KQJ, King Queen Jack.

[@vinyl1Earthlink]

My time was 56 minutes, so I did solve it. Ana is a back-formation from words like Johnsoniana or Shakespeariana.

[@robertfoster6070]

I usually complete the Saturday Express prize crossword in my head before writing anything in.

[@ambigyouus1]

1a: early on you seem to refer to presumably a "vade mecum" - a portable handbook again named from the Latin. 8d: perhaps the Edda not the ana?

[@hoagy_ytfc]

“Setter” is clue for dog is beautifully mischievous.

[@Raven-Creations]

1D is cove rage, like road rage gives rise to an incident in the street, using the language of tabloid reporters. The Sally Army is the Salvation Army - I'm sure you know this, but it seemed to slip your mind. That was a tough puzzle, but apart from cave canem and Anthony Adverse, which required specific knowledge, the clues were very fair. Once you spot the answer, most of them are just really clever clues, with superb misdirection. I did like the Lord's single, and that side with monarch was brilliantly evil. That bein=bat was also fiendish. The buffet car was just a lovely bit of cluing. Even "don" was taking a classic cryptic clue and using it in a different sense. I wouldn't have got Anthony Adverse, but apparently it's "a 1936 American epic historical drama film", and even this subverts ones idea of a historic work.

[@oregonexpat]

The only thing I can lay claim to is seeing that it was a coin reference, everything else was outside my experience, and I can only take solace in the fact that I am not English, and thus mostly don’t have a clue what they are thinking about when they made the puzzle . What is a Bovverboy?

[@thescrewfly]

A nickname for a skinhead troublemaker, one seeking "bother".

[@poppyholly1759]

(UK) A hooligan who creates bother (trouble), specifically a member of a skinhead gang. In South London accent Bother pronounced as Bovver.

[@andrewgrant6516]

The best presenter before the start of the week is back. (5)

[@Rockki2]

I get cove rage sometimes in my boat 😊

[@forthrightgambitia1032]

K King is also an abbreviation in playing cards...

[@RoderickEtheria]

Road rage for cars, cove rage for boats?

[@_mnejing]

"Ana" may be easy for some of your viewers to understand if you consider the word "Americana." Which is, more or less, things that represent the "story" of America or are distinctly "American." According to Wiktionary, they share the same root.

[@yaboyJJJJJ]

Hey, I'm not sure if you guys read replies often, but I would like to ask that in future cryptic crosswords you would explain a bit more about why certain answers fit the questions. In sudoku videos you explain every single time that the digits of a row sum to 45, but in this puzzle you just say "twig can be get" without any explanation. I want to like cryptic crosswords but they mostly seem like absolute gibberish to me, and even with the answers I still often have no clue how that's a fair puzzle.

[@peterjohnclayton]

Cave Canum - Beware of the dog! It bit you...

[@nendwr]

*Canem. It's third declension. Like Romanes. ;-)

[@purplezart]

@@nendwr "people called 'romanes' they go the house"?!

[@wdvorak]

Monarch is the head for a country, but I don't think I've every heard of that term/word.

[@waneasle]

I'm going on a first date today! ☺️ Not that it has anything to do with the video but wanted to share anyways.

[@CrackingTheCryptic]

Good luck, hope it goes great!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Have fun!

[@TheMeanAdmin]

Not as fast solve as we would normally see from Mark - maybe that's why I managed to keep up with a good quarter of it. Not sure about the rest - maybe because English is not my first (or second, or third) language, maybe because my education severely lacked in cricket curriculum, so it cannot qualify as sufficiently classic, or maybe because I'm not nearly as terminally British as the setter is ^^;

[@Fogmeister]

I knew the first one was using "setter" as an example of a dog. And "canum" is the latin for dog. I didn't realise until I googled that "Cave Canum" is latin for "beware of the dog" :D

[@bibliopolist]

Well, not really. Canum is the genitive plural, as in "of the dogs". Dog is "canis" or, a bit older-fashioned, "canes" (both words exist). The accusative of the latter is "canem", as found on that classical mosaic from Pompei.

[@johnsouza4391]

Cove is a bay. So 'rage' in a 'cove'...coverage. clever.

[@kumquats1000]

Can we get a video of you trying to speed solve one of these once?

[@oldinion]

setter maybe = doggo, => cave canem

[@pascalpp]

Yelling "coin" at my screen for 10 minutes 😛

[@lanaevans8319]

monarch is head, headstay is a part of a baost

[@HeroDarkStorn]

There are people who set cross-words. There are people who solve cross-words. There are people who solve cross-words for best time. There are people who fake their solve to get best time. TIL: There are also people, who prove fake cross-word solvers to be fake cross-word solvers.

[@archivist17]

What a stinker! But an enjoyable one. 😀

[@lizzyvv447]

I thought Simon had heard of the phrase Cave Canem? I'm pretty sure I've heard him say it on this channel a few times!

[@matthewjohnson6360]

You fill in a bubble, like with tests when it comes to voting in the states.

[@longwaytotipperary]

As in Irish Setter.

[@sumyrda2772]

Those tests where you fill in bubbles on a scannable card are also a US thing. It's not done like that in Europe.

[@johnsouza4391]

Were you thinking of 'edda' not 'ana'?

[@leonardopalozzi620]

Side with Monarch Scottish banker providing support

[@shalaz1981]

Nibs and nobs is indeed from cribbage.

[@highpath4776]

are they interchangable ? I know one relates to the Jack/Knave

[@shalaz1981]

@@highpath4776 they both relate the Jack. If the dealer cuts a Jack, the dealer pegs two points before play starts. This is known as a nib. When a player has a Jack in their hand that matches the suit of the cut card, the player pegs one additional point during scoring. This is known as a nob.

[@longwaytotipperary]

@@shalaz1981 thanks for the explanation!

[@cakemonitor842]

I've always played it as 'two for his heels' and 'one for his nob'. I've not heard of 'nibs' before, is that a regional thing?

[@highpath4776]

@@shalaz1981 Cheers, no wonder I was confused.

[@leonardopalozzi620]

Leedstay

[@tomrussell7899]

cave canem beware of dog(a setter?)

[@nwdreamer]

Well, I can tell I won't be doing any of these any time soon! Most of the answers are unknowable for Americans using our version of English!

[@elLooto]

That and the numerous cricket references in this one.

[@ZahraIsMyDog]

This is fantastic. Please do more of these! BTW, most of America uses voting machines.

[@Sponsie1000]

it's kinda weird how so many clues are to do with cricket in particular. Like, l understand that the main demographic is Brittain and that sport is quite big over there, but it's still way more niche than for instance knowing the abbreviations for the chess-pieces

[@highpath4776]

The american ones were a bit baseball / NFL orientated !!

[@sarahnash7174]

Yes indeed, one for his non (or his nibs) is cribbage

[@TheClawNinja]

This is some messed up stuff here...

[@henrymarkson3758]

noballs, arundel, holbein. Too many cricket references.