Inquisitor 1683

[sunny-dave]

No question - just a Listener style commendation for an excellent puzzle by Ifor (one of my favourite setters).

Took a good bit of clue parsing to get the quotation and the instruction absolutely straight - but then there were a couple of delightful PDMs as I finished off the puzzle.

Thanks Ifor - I hope some of my fellow Listener addicts will have the time to have a go at this.

[Iforcrosswords]

Thank you, Dave. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[Hagen]

Yes, this was terrific, wasn't it? You always get good value with Ifor.

[Keepatit]

Can I give a contrary view? The final step shows up how disparate and loosely connected the thematic elements are. Only two of the thematic group would have been reachable by the highlighting. I see the need to show that you’ve unscrambled them, and why one wouldn’t wish to create new non-words by altering the grid, but it’s rather tenuous and arbitrary to pick one who predates it. Ifor’s puzzles are rather hit or miss for me. Clever and precise clueing, often a leap of faith or reason at the end. But, as ever, quot sententiae tot homines: suus cuique mos

[Keepatit]

Or even quot homines tot sententiae ... mea culpa, Terence