Cryptics from button_pj Trivia Quiz

Answer: Viaduct

The word used indicates that the answer will be one word composed from two others, all either directly given in, or suggested by words in, the clue. (Note that this type of clue can involve more than three words, but this clue is too short to have room for more.)

From the clue structure, it seems we are looking for a word that means bridge - but there are a lot of them, so the place to start is with the smaller words. The phrase 'by way of' is a standard crossword clue for the word VIA (which is from a Latin word meaning way or road, so in the ablative meaning by way of). An airconditioning vent is often called DUCT - although ducts can also carry a range of liquids and gases.

Putting the two together gives us a VIADUCT, which is indeed a type of bridge. Looking somewhat like the ancient Roman aqueducts (used to carry water), a viaduct is a bridge constructed on a series of arches used to carry a road or railroad track across a low-lying area between two points of roughly equal elevation. These were named in the 19th century, when they became numerous due to railway construction being built to take the shortest path between two points, rather than detouring as an old road might have done. The 'via' still means road, and 'duct' comes from a participial form of 'ducere', which means to lead - so these lead roads from one place to another, as the aqueduct led water from its source to its destination.

Answer: Ecotype

The word strange is an indicator that you are looking for an anagram, so the letters written in capital letters need to be rearranged to form a single word whose definition is given in the rest of the question. The hint hopefully led you to group the letters ECO as part of the answer; adding TYPE leads to ECOTYPE, which may be unfamiliar, but at least looks like a possible word.

And indeed, an ecotype is defined as a specific part of a population (of any type of organism) which is adapted to specific local conditions, leading to it having different characteristics from those of the rest of the population of the same species living nearby in different conditions. For example, the same plant growing at different elevations in a mountain range will show different ability to cope with temperature and/or water differences between zones. These would be labelled the low elevation ecotype and the high elevation ecotype.

Answer: Uvula

The word sounds like is an indicator that this question requires you to find words suggested by the sentence which can be said aloud to produce the word indicated by the other part of the clue. Unless the clue is intentionally tricky, the words following sounds like should be the ones you say aloud. You view is straightforward in sound, be the rest of the word has to de determined from knowing the sixth note on the diatonic scale: do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do - you remember it from the song, right? So the sixth note is la.

Putting the three syllables together, we can get UVU (from you view) + LA, or UVULA, a fleshy flap that hangs at the back of the throat.

Answer: Tarpaulin

The word in is an indicator for placing the letters of one word inside the letters of another. The first part of the clue, waterproof sheet, looks like the definition of the answer. Pauli might be one of the two words, or it might require some association (from my background, the Pauli exclusion principle springs to mind, but I am not sure what I can do with it); leave it for now. The next step is finding a single word for a mountain lake which can be broken up to be placed around the inner word. This is a common crossword clue: the word TARN comes from a Norse word meaning pool, and refers to a (usually small) lake located in a steep-sided crater such as those formed by glaciers.

Since the answer has 9 letters, the inner word must have 5 letters. This suggests we can use Pauli directly, and that works - TAR(PAULI)N, or tarpaulin, is indeed a sheet of waterproofed material. Traditionally, a tarp was made from canvas or other heavy material, but that has changed in recent years. Now a tarp may be made of lighter synthetic material with a polyurethane coating to waterproof it, or even purely from plastic such as polythene.

Answer: Synod

Odd and even are indicators that the answer may be found by selecting every other letter from some of the words in the clue, to find a word whose definition is also given. Odds starts with the first letter, evens with the second letter.

The word we are looking for might be a church council or it might be something like an idiom, suggested by the words saying old - but that would make more sense as old saying. The inversion makes it look as if those words are in that order for a reason, so let's break them down into alternates. The whole phrase 'for saying old' might be involved, so consider FRAIGL (odds if starting with for) and OSYNOD (evens if starting with for). I spy with my little eye a word that describes a church council - a synod is an official meeting of the leaders of a Christian group (often the bishops) to discuss matters of doctrine or administration.

If we only considered the letters of SAYING OLD, we would have used the odd letters, as indicated in the clue, to produce SYNOD.

Answer: Gregorian calendar

The word arranged signals an anagram, so one of the two phrases in the clue must have the necessary 17 letters that can be rearranged to produce the two words related to the other phrase. 'Landing gear or race' has 17 letters; 'current yearly chart' has 18 letters, so it looks as if the former is the base for the anagram.

Looking at the 17 letters (I like to write them down with the consonants on one row, and the vowels underneath, so their relationship to the original words is softened) and thinking about a yearly chart, I see CALENDAR available, and it has 8 letters, so could possibly be the second word. What is left is INGGEAROR (maybe in another order, depending on which exact letters you removed for the calendar). Now the word 'current' becomes clear - there have been many calendars used over time by different cultures, but in our society the current one is the GREGORIAN CALENDAR, adopted in various countries at different times starting in 1582, when Pope Gregory XIII introduced it.

Answer: October Revolution

This is getting tricky! The word organisation suggests an anagram, but there are three bits to the clue: Short for the 10th month, volunteer robot, and a Bolshevik coup. Since the 10th month is October, that first phrase suggests we need to include the letters OCT. Combining them with the letters of VOLUNTEER ROBOT gives us the necessary 17 letters.

So apparently we need to produce a two-word phrase relating to Bolshevik coup. A coup suggests a revolution might be in the answer, which leaves OCT and OBER, which can be combined to form October (kind of makes you wonder why it was shortened in the first place, doesn't it). Altogether, that is OCTOBER REVOLUTION, the name used to designate the second uprising in Russia during the year 1917, which saw Lenin's Bolshevik Party start its rise to control the nation during ensuing years of civil war. The date the insurrection started was 25 October on the calendar then in use in Russia, or 7 November in the contemporary calendar. It was not until February of 1918 that the Russians changed from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar.

Answer: Bicarbonate of soda

The word makes suggests another anagram, using words with a total of 17 letters in them. there are two halves, with the first four words, STAB OF RADIO BEACON, having 17 letters. Can we rearrange them to produce something referred to as saleratus to ease your digestion? If you happen to know that saleratus is an old name for baking soda, you are hot on the track! Baking soda, NaHCO3, is also called sodium bicarbonate, or BICARBONATE OF SODA - the HCO3- ion is bicarbonate, and sodium used to be referred to as soda in its compounds.

Sodium bicarbonate dissolves in water to produce a liquid with antacid properties, that can be taken to ease acid reflux symptoms. In cooking, baking soda is used as a leavening agent, as it releases carbon dioxide when heated or mixed with an acid. Baking powder usually contains a mixture of sodium bicarbonate and a powdered acid such as cream of tartar, so that no other acid needs to be added once water has activated the reaction. Saleratus (sometimes seen as salaratus) comes from the Latin 'sal aeratus', meaning aerated salt, to describe the leavening agent's action - it is a white powder like salt, and it introduces air bubbles into the bread.

Answer: Anabolic Steroid

In this clue, rearranging indicates an anagram. Since the words following that have a total of 15 letters, they look like the ones to rearrange to form a two-word phrase related to a performance enhancing chemical. Starting with the target phrase, performance enhancing chemicals may be stimulants such as amphetamines (to increase energy release), hormones such as EPO (which increases red blood cell production, hence oxygen availability) or anabolic steroids (which increase muscle mass).

The last one works - the letters of BISECTIONAL ROAD can be rearranged to produce ANABOLIC STEROID.

Answer: Ultraconservative

The word becomes indicates an anagram. Since the first part of the clue is rather nonsensical, those are probably the letters to rearrange in order to produce a word describing a vehement opponent of progress. Of course, the punctuation is going to be left behind, and we will only use the actual letters for our answer. A CARNIVORE'S T.V. LUTE can be transformed into ULTRACONSERVATIVE, which works.

As a social and political position, a conservative favors the continuation of tradition and resists change. As the prefix ultra- indicates, the word ultraconservative would describe an individual or group whose resistance to change is even stronger than is the case for what might be called a mainstream or middle-of-the-road conservative. It is most commonly used in a political or religious context.