Ancient method of encipherment with a message wrapped around a cylinder / WED 12-27-23 / Crystalline mineral deposits in some caves / Novelist King who wrote "Caretakers" and "One on One" / Some handoff recipients in football, for short / "Great" 10th-century emperor / Japanese exporter of diesel engines
Constructor: Kareem Ayas
Relative difficulty: Medium
THEME: THESAURUS (33D: Writer's reference ... or what each row of shaded [in my case, circled] letters is missing?) — shaded letters spell out the first part of dinosaur names ... minus THE "SAURUS" part. Also those shaded dinosaur name parts break across black squares, which I guess are supposed to represent the ASTEROID that caused the dinosaurs to go extinct? (4D: What had a major impact on this puzzle's theme), but I could be making that part up ...
Theme answers:
LEBRON / TOE (15A: "King James" / 16A: Word before nail or after steel)
ALARMIST / EGOISM (24A: Voice of doom / 27A: It's a me problem)
MARTYR / ANNOTATE (44A: One dying for a cause / 47A: Leave a mark on?)
GAL / LOAFER (58A: Jug unit: Abbr. / 59A: Comfy shoe)
Word of the Day: SCYTALE (40D: Ancient method of encipherment with a message wrapped around a cylinder) —
The recipient uses a rod of the same diameter on which the parchment is wrapped to read the message. (wikipedia)
• • •
A very cute revealer pun, but the theme feels kind of muddled or confusing because of the ASTEROID / black square stuff. The puzzle *leads* with the ASTEROID bit ... and then immediately afterward, I get the dinosaur name parts, and those name parts have a big hole in them (i.e. they're each broken by a black square), which I assume represents some kind of ASTEROID crater (???). So it looks like "this puzzle's theme" is an asteroid impact / dinosaur extinction theme. But then I get this punny revealer, which, again, I like, but ... is the ASTEROID thing a mirage? Are the dino name parts broken across black squares Just Because? I guess there's really no other way you're gonna get something like "TYRANNO" in the grid *except* to break it across a black square, but still, I feel like the ASTEROID bit is a cutesy little self-referential "bonus" answer that made matters confusing. I know no one can lay off puns, and the "had a major impact" pun [wink wink nudge nudge get it!?] was probably irresistible, but all it led to for me was disappointment that the ASTEROID did not, actually, have a major impact on this theme. Or it's being coy about it? If it were thematic, truly thematic, I'd expect it to be *symmetrical* to THESAURUS, but it's not. It's symmetrical with PRITZKER, which is ironic, as I think the architecture today is kinda wobbly. Or the concept is. Or it's trying to do too much. Or does too little. Or gets caught in no man's land. The ASTEROID is too big an element to bring in and *not* have it be meaningful, so maybe I should just stand by my initial (if tentative) impression—that it's a "no SAURUS" theme on two levels (SAURUS missing from the dino names, and all the SAURUSes missing from the earth on account of the ASTEROID). Whatever is going on, the THE / SAURUS revealer is clever and inventive.
[Or maybe ... [It's a me problem]]
The fill was really off in a couple of places (not the PHIL, though, the PHIL was fine). That NE corner was ruff. Something about the word SEISM is just inherently ugly to me, but then there's the connection to "mass extinction event," which was not a connection my brain ever would have made (did a SEISM kill the dinosaurs?). That word is crammed in that cramped corner with the ambiguous OHS (not AHS) and the horrendous random "Great" emperor OTTOI ("Great" hardly tells me anything ... seems like they're all "great," all those emperors and popes and whoever ... they can't all be great! Frederick and Leo and Otto and the rest of them need a death match where only one "Great" is left standing!) (11D: "Great" 10th-century emperor). APLIT LAIKA hurt a little too. I have no idea who this TABITHA author is, but that's OK, that happens. What's honestly not OK is ... SCYTALE? Am I saying that right? (I'm saying it like it's a story you tell on an airplane). "She-TALL-ay?" "Sidle?" "Skittle?" I assume this is one of those words meant to make the nerdiest puzzle people happy, but alas, I am (strangely) not one of those people, so it's just a bunch of random letters, from beginning to end, which ... on a Friday or Saturday, maybe, fine, but on a Wednesday, oof. Its effect on my solve was totally predictable—it became the only thing I could focus on or think of. It is, by light years, the most obscure thing in the grid, and you don't want anything that obscure (and especially that obscure and that Big) taking attention away from your theme. Bizarre. You will be unsurprised to learn, as I was just now, that SCYTALE is a debut. More proof that people's wordlists are running them and not the other way around.
TROU is always bad. Why will constructors not recognize this and act accordingly? I didn't make any outright errors today except spelling LEIKA like so (somewhere between the dog and camera) and putting in BESTS before FEATS (6D: Guinness records, typically)—in that case, my answer is the correct one for the clue, which is nonsense. All deeds are FEATS. A "feat" is just a thing you do. Whereas Guinness is, paradigmatically, filled with BESTs. Fastests, shortests, tallests, longests, etc. This puzzle was a feat. Maybe not the best. But it's got a good core idea, and the revealer definitely made me go "ah [not "oh"], good one!"
Still got a lot of Holiday Pet Pics to get through (again, please don't send more, can't use 'em this year—next year!), so let's see what's going on in Petville.
[Archie looks like me after 2 days straight of eating Christmas dinner at every meal. My hat's not that cool, though (thanks, Susan)]
[Actually, *this* is much closer to my vibe right now. I feel you, Stewie! (thanks, anonymous)]
[No room for gifts. Maya is the only gift. Please step back and admire from afar (thanks, Patrick)]
[I can't remember if this came to me as a "Holiday Pet Pic" or not but I like it so I'm including it. Nellie! Good kitty! (thanks, Ellen)]
[Emmy plots midnight tree destruction. Yes, this ornament will smash nicely ... (Thanks, Barbara)]
[Maurice turned 8 this Hanukkah, which he feels is fitting; please enjoy his poofy face (thanks, anonymous Maurice owner!)]
The asteroid that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs - about 65 million years ago - is considered by many evolutionary biologists to be the most important event (like, ever) in the evolution of mammals. Since we’re the “alpha” species, and we are really just fancy mammals (with all the available “upgrades”), without Chixulub, there would be no hominids, no humans, and the world would still be pristine but savage - take your pick (I go with pristine - it’s pretty savage as ir is).
See Wikipedia entry below.
I.M.O., the whole “center of gravity” of the puzzle IS the asteroid!
Seasons greetings, Bill Lambos Self-proclaimed “Wizard of CrossWorld”
——— The Chicxulub crater (IPA: [t͡ʃikʃuˈluɓ] ⓘ) is an impact crater buried underneath the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. Its center is offshore, but the crater is named after the onshore community of Chicxulub Pueblo.[3] It was formed slightly over 66 million years ago when a large asteroid, about ten kilometers (six miles) in diameter, struck Earth. The crater is estimated to be 180 kilometers (110 miles) in diameter and 20 kilometers (12 miles) in depth. It is the second largest confirmed impact structure on Earth, and the only one whose peak ring is intact and directly accessible for scientific research.[4] ——-
Hard for a Wedensday, with SCYTALE being the biggest WoE. I could picture the device, but could not come up with a name for it. Did not know TABITHA or IRV.
Some weirdly interesting fill here and there but overall this was not a fully realized puzzle. The theme was disjoint - Rex highlights the ASTEROID - revealer issue. 30 years ago my son was big into dinosaurs so by osmosis I could complete the shaded boxes - but uninterested other than that.
This one played hard for me. Got through it but in way above-average time. SCYTALE and PRITZKER don’t strike me as average Wednesday words. Still, I liked the theme and it helped the solve, once I got it. Need to look up NITER.
When I saw BRON TO, I thought, “Hmm, dinosaurs?” I did not have any of the other behemoths by the time I got to the revealer, and with a couple of crossing letters, I saw the one-word THESAURUS. Then I saw the two-word THE SAURUS and was utterly delighted. And then it was fun getting the others, especially since I was a dinosaur fanatic as a kid. I didn’t see the ASTEROID cutting the dinos in two, I just thought it was a clever punny addition to the theme, and of course the only way to make dinosaur names not be dinosaur names is to split them across words.
There was a bit of a bonus theme answer with HORNS. The clue (“feature of many ceratopsians”) probably sounded like gibberish to most, but I thought of “triceratops” so it had to be HORNS. and that was before I knew there was a dino-theme.
I thought there might be a problem that BRONTOSAURUS was renamed ALLOSAURUS, but I looked it up and I was wrong. It is true that BRONTOSAURUS is no longer used. Paleontologists decided that it and Apatosaurus were really the same beast so they dropped BRONTO because Apatosaurus was named first. So no foul there unless you object because BRONTOSAURUS is no longer used. It died out in more ways than one.
Some nice misdirect clues for AUGER, SPIES and TROU. (I don’t agree that the latter should be “dropped” from word lists. Get it?)
Mini-theme of comfy shoes with SLIP-ONS and LOAFER. Like another extinct dinosaur, Ward Cleaver, the TYRANNO SAURUS liked to change into slip-on loafers after a long day at the office. With a cocktail that he was unable to lift to his lips. Sigh.
There was some crazy obscure stuff in here (meaning, I didn’t know them, with the inglorious SCYTALE leading the pack), but somehow I got through this with no Naticks, so therefore the crosses were officially fair. I would be happy never to see SCYTALE again. But the revealer was super cute!
Brontosaurus has been resurrected as a dino name ... or not, depending on which classification you believe. Many paleontologists recognize two genera, Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus; others lump them all into Apatosaurus.
See here for more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4393826/
Thanks Kitshef for the clarification about Brontosaurus and Allosaurus. I heard that Brontosaurus was in use again but I didn’t realize that it depends on which expert you ask! To be fair, it is amazing what scientists learn from fossils from the Age of Dinosaurs.
Except for Allosaurus I knew all these words when I was going through the dinosaur stage as a kid. ( I had a plastic T Rex in the now considered wrong upright position, for years).
Saw we were doing a dinosaur thing after BRON TO and ST EGO and I thought the THESAURUS connection was brilliant. I guess needing SCYTALE to make this all work is the price that is paid, but I have to say it's a word I have never seen or heard of in crosswords or anywhere else. Today's learning experience.
Not much flow to this one as the corners were isolated. I didn't know PHIL but __HIL made that one inevitable. Anyone else remember Joe ISUZU? And strangely enough, if you asked me the name of the first dog in space, I would have said LAIKA instantly. Don't ask me what day it is though.
Really clever theme, KA. Knew Almost everything and thought there was some straining to make it all work, but a worthy achievement nonetheless. Thanks for all the fun.
Hey All ! I'm still wondering why the Dinos are split. The Blockers that split the names have no significance to the Theme. Unless you go the ASTEROID "split" them from Earth? Do I need a SCYTALE to figure it out?
Did get a chuckle out of the literal Revealer. Kinda wacky the two "Revealers" are asymmetrical.
Aren't humans today closer in time to the TYRANNO than the TYRANNO to the first dinoSAURS, or something? Fascinating stuff.
Nice F fest in bottom-center. Speaking of which, I'd bet 99% put in SEMPER for ADESTE. My last letter was the A cross of SCYTALE/ADESTE. Man, Natick Alert! Could've been any vowel.
Wednesday already. Time flies when you have Monday off!
We live across the street from a Catholic church named for a MARTYR, where I'm sure they sang ADESTE Fidelis to welcome KRIS Kringle. Got ASTEROID off the I in LICIT so figured it would be an Atari theme, but THE SAURUS cleared that up. A puzzle my kids would have liked when they were young, and actually SCYTALE is right up the older one's alley; he of the cryptography website and all.
From the Dune Wiki: Scytale [d. 10210 AG] was a Face Dancer of the Bene Tleilax, and later the youngest Masheikh and the last Tleilaxu Master, who played a prominent role in major historical events that spanned more than five thousand years.
When I read the clue for scytale I remembered that I had seen this concept, probably learned about it in school when I was young, but there was no way in hell I was going to come up with the name anymore. Got it completely from crosses.
Would have had a tougher time without the dinosaur names in the shaded boxes. With them it played easy for me.
DNF. SCYTALE/ADESTE/NITER. Just brutal for me. Is this really fair for a Wednesday??? Not a clue about any of these, and crossing ADESTE with those two seems cruel.
I loved the joke - got a (silent) bark of laughter from me [nod to the holiday pets]. For me, the ASTEROID "destruction" was a bonus, and thank you to @Wanderlust and @Andy Freude for pointing out that the triceratops is in there, too, via its HORNS and the clue...and also the TRI(athaton). Another bonus was learning SCYTALE (I think the dictionary is telling me to pronounce it SKY-ta-lee), a word I don't recall ever seeing and a device interesting to learn about, possibly of use to SPIES.
@Andy Freude - I can understand your joy at the two Beethoven references :)
I didn't notice the theme until I got to the revealer. In fact, after getting ASTEROID my first shaded squares were at the end of ALARMIST, which I thought you might call someone predicting an asteroid impact, but that didn't PAN OUT (I phrase I've only ever heard in the negative, btw). I was happy when I figured out.
But SCYTALE? It's unknown to Dictionary.com, but it does have its own Wikipedia article,but sheesh! I needed all the crosses for that one, whereas I could guess the final A in TABITHA and the final V in IRV, unless there's something called RSaP.
You’re right… nowadays, PAN OUT tends to be used in statements like “This theme didn’t really pan out”, meaning live up to its potential. Or maybe it’s always been like that? I presume this came from expressions used by 19th century gold prospectors. Surely, then as now, it was used for successful outcomes as well. Interesting.
The entire SE section is (in my opinion, others may thrive on this stuff) an excellent example of the NYT at their arcane, trivia-testing, sleep-inducing best. The crosses have a nice touch starting it off with the requisite yet still benign TRE, then it kicks right into overdrive with Modern Family DAVE, a nice TREVI from Rome, our good friend Van Gough gets a nod, ISUZU, and a tribute to The Outlaws (KRIS Kristofferson) - wow. But Wait ! Not to be outdone, the downs kick in with PROTZKER (!), ELISE, and the world-renowned IRV Gotti ! Congrats to the NYT editorial team - you have really outdone yourself today.
It appears as though I may just have a minor philosophical disagreement with the NYT’s approach to crosswords.
Fun theme--but I was basically lost in Natick on this one. SCYT_LE/_DESTE, no idea. PRITZ_ER/_R_S/_RV. Erm. . . Nope. I rather enjoy Mr. ___tofferson too.
We got a ST FRANCIS and a "ST EGO." (Shouldn't there be an abbreviation in the clue for the answer to be abbreviated?)
I went to the Deutsches Museum in Munich once. It was dedicated to FEATS of engineering. It had many, many rooms, full of machines of all sorts (including ancient musical instruments, the reason I went -- I have a clavichord I commissioned after an anonymous 17th century one in their collection).One room was of encryption devices. There was indeed a SCYTALE. And an enigma machine. And many other things. It was a very German museum, in the cafeteria afterward I feasted on a big plate of wurst and kraut with a big stein of bier. Never saw anything like it anywhere else, except maybe the Henry Ford Museum in Michigan, which was not nearly as well curated.
Van Gogh, as he slipped farther and farther into mental illness, said his greatest masterpiece was when "IRISES for more than a few minutes before I goes back to bed."
A little slower than usual for a Wednesday. When the wife asked why it took so long, I pointed at the puzzle and said "Therein lies a SCYTALE."
Show me the country with the lowest median age and I'll show you AFRICAn young country.
I'm reliving my Dino fixation from my youth with my 6 year old granddaughter. Great fun! Thanks, Kareem Ayas.
Didn't particularly care for this, but it reminded me of the Sinclair Oil pavilion at the 1964/1965 Worlds Fair. It was one of my faves to visit. You could insert money in a machine that dispensed plastic dinosaurs in different colors. I had a green triceratops and a bronze T-rex. My brother got a stegosaurus and a brontosaurus. I think maybe we had a couple of others.
I wish A.P. answers would be banned from the puzzle. It's such lazy fill. You can turn any school subject into a nonsense word by sticking AP in front of it. It's become a plague at the Times.
I liked the King James clue following a book of the bible one.
I like Andy FREUDE's ode to JOY in the comments.
"Life on Earth", a series on Netflix narrated by Morgan Freeman, has a devastating re-enactment of the asteroid impact and its effects on the planet. Very interesting to visit lots of eras in the planets history besides the dinosaurs.
Classic Rex long opening paragraph theme overthink:) - as well as wit, humor and humanity.
Very tough for me with the bottom half generating most of the difficulty. Did not know SCYTALE, PRITZKER, TABITHA, and NITER (as clued)…yew before ELM and unite>Marry>MERGE..KRIS with a c at first..IRV and PHIL were late showing up…tough bottom half.
Nice solid Wednesday, liked theme, didn't mind ASTEROID at all, I'm simple minded
Probably would've been easy, but I was convinced the coded message toughie was CODEX , which I remembered from The DaVinci Code. Like RP, got distracted there. I kept trying to fit an X in somehow, but eventually got it right since crosses were pretty easy
Dinothesauruses! thUmbsUp, on the theme, with that cool 33-D revealer. @Muse darlin no doubt woulda had a primo avatar-of-the-day for this rodeo.
no-knows weren't too bad, at our house. Just mainly: 1. SCYTALESAURUS. 2. TABITHASAURUS. 3. IRV-O-SAURUS.
staff weeject pick: RBS. Plural abbreve meat, plus darn near a gimme(s).
fave SAURUS: MARTYR+ANNOTATE Rex.
Not too much fight in the solvequest, until reachin that there SCYTALE epoch, where the dinos at least helped pitch in, as crossers. (Cuz by then BRONTO & STEGO had kinda clued m&e in.)
Thanx for the seismic solvequest, Mr. Ayas dude. And congratz on yer high-saurin' debut. Darn near scy-high, but therein lies a tale...
The NE and SW corners were a little tough, but the rest was an absolute breeze. Solved in half the time of yesterday’s utter slog. I’m convinced that in midweek puzzles (Tue-Thu) what makes one hard or easy really revolves around how you click with the creator’s clueing style.
Omg I thought this same thing and kept trying to remember what it was called, as it was sure it was this — but apparently that was a “cryptex,” and apparently it’s not even a real thing! Haha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptex
I've long suspected that AP (advanced placement) courses are some kind of administrative stratagem to finagle credit for both high schools and COLLEGES so that they both get funds from state and federal agencies for teaching one course. What's next, APPE?
I did major side eye to RIVET as the answer to 34D "It helps keep a tight ship tight". RIVETs haven't been used in ship construction since at least the 1960s. Advances in metallurgy and welding techniques have made them obsolete. RIVETs are still used in many applications but ship building isn't one of them.
Life has gotten much better since I stopped watching or listening to news programs. I just check the headlines in the NYT to see if an ASTEROID is headed our way. If not then I move on to the crossword.
I was quite tired last night; maybe that is why this seemed a bit challenging for a Wednesday. That whole SCYTALE ADESTE NITER area was brutal! Fortunately I used to work in architecture so PRITZKER was a nice gimme.
Xmas was great, although snowless. I entered my nephew's new house to see he had covered the entire kitchen island with a vinyl tablecloth and a few colored markers. Already written were some greetings like "Welcome Shawna!" (his son's fiance's sister from England). I thought: what a great but weird idea! Turns out the tablecloth was covering a piece of plywood, as they are renovating and the new countertop wasn't ready. But we had a remarkable amount of fun drawing and writing on it. Later in the evening, every time someone said something funny we would write it down. And because we were all drinking, a lot of things seemed funny.
[No Spelling Bee yd cuz too tired but: my streak in Dordle reached 200!]
I can’t put my finger on why, but I didn’t enjoy doing this one at all. Maybe I have not understood the significance , if any. of the place where the names were chopped up; the importance of the black squares ; and, if any, the relevance of the names of the dinosaurs. I did learn something—horned animals like dinosaurs are “beaked.”
@gfrpeace (10:48). You remind me of the Bayernhof Music Museum in Pittsburgh. Major collection of automated musical instruments from the 19th and 20th centuries, in an unusual German-style mansion. Some one-of-a-kinds.
Medium for a Wednesday? NOT. Looking back over it now I'm not sure why it was so difficult. I had never heard of Tabitha King, nor of Scytale (which I'lm about to look up) nor the architects award I'm still not sure what the clue for 13D "seism" is saying. Oh yeah, I could not remember Laika, but that's a pretty famous name. I did, however find it so difficult that I was expecting a dif. ruing for a Wednesday.
Took a while for the impact of the ASTEROID (which I got early on) to sink in, twigging THESAUR(i)S, and helping greatly with the solve. My spelling often suffers from not seeing words written out, esp the downs.
All was good except for the 'K' in LAIKA (altho inferable, compared to 'd' or 'b'), and the end of PRITZKER; hence only SOP was correct in the SE.
UnitE before MERGE. Stephen before TABITHA (of whom I know, but haven't read).
Fun adventure in downs-o land; very enjoyable challenge! :) ___ Paolo Pasco's New Yorker Mon. is med (so far, at 3 NYT Sats); stymied at the cross of the 'Globe Theatre' / 'magic pasta pot' [update: guessed correctly, and learned two new things]. Still working on Sunday's downs-o (7 hrs in); only two tricky areas remaining. On to Stan Newman's Mon. Stumper 🤞, with Patrick Berry's New Yorker cryptic on deck for tm. ___ Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness ~ Freudenfreude & a DAP to all 👊 🙏
@Joe Dipinto. My second-earliest memory is of the dinosaurs at the 1964-5 World's Fair, which was tremendous fun. We bought a great book there with very dynamic artist's renderings of dinosaurs, which alas is long gone. We stayed in a hotel - an experience in itself - and I remember hearing my heartbeat in my ears but thinking it was brontosaurus footsteps.
My earliest memory is being in the hospital with gastroenteritis. That was less fun.
Haven’t read the comments yet, but Rex criticized the answer FEATS. That puzzles me Feats has a connotation of a great accomplishment not just any action. Fits well with the Guinness book of records. A lot of feats there!
I thought the puzzle was OK. The theme helped me get some of the obscure stuff. I did have to get every cross for scytale! (Autocorrect wanted scythe).
In case some of y'all aren't already aware of this, phrases like 28A PAN OUT and "Hit paydirt" originated from a method of looking for gold. A scoop of sediment and some water from a creek or stream bed would be put in a shallow container or PAN and swirled around. Lighter elements would wash out over the edges of the pan leaving behind heavier elements. Gold is relatively heavy so if the sediment had any it would be paydirt and the gold would remain as one of the last things to PAN OUT. So a question like "How did it PAN OUT today?" might be answered "Great! I hit paydirt!"
@egs -- @kitshef's grammar is absolutely correct. The thing that's "long gone" and is the subject of the verb "to be" is the book, not the artist's renderings.
I delayed doing this (or trying to, anyway) until today (Thurs). Big mistake. I shouldn't have tried to do it at all. Not worth the time and effort. Worst in quite a while, but this category is filling up rapidly.
The site ate my comment, which is probably just as well. This mess was a complete waste of time. Worst in quite a while, but, as I wrote earlier, this category is filling up rapidly.
Wow. An English prof (!) who doesn't know who Tabitha (Mrs. Stephen) King is. W-o-w.
Anyway, nice theme & execution. It's as if the animals were cut in two by the SEISM. A theme lagniappe with the clue for HORNS.
New word learned: SCYTALE. Fair crosses, so a Wednesday pass. Writeover: bEsTS before FEATS. Clue misprint in my paper: "One daying [sic] for a cause." Luckily, with the -TYR ending, there could be no doubt.
Let us make TABITHA our DOD. If she's good enough for Steve, she's good enough for me. Birdie.
Very very easy Wednesday, even with the completely unknown SCYTALE, since the crosses were basically gimmes. Loved dinosaurs when I was a kid, and my brother and I had lots of them! I'm surprised by how many didn't know ADESTE Fideles! It's been a Christmas classic for over 200 years, sung by choirs everywhere around the world. It's probably heard more often in English nowadays than Latin, but it's often sung in both languages by choirs. First in one language, then followed by the other language.
Oh, and to follow up on SCYTALE, there was one site that had five variations on the pronunciation of this word . I guess there's no wrong way to pronounce it.
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Tabitha King is a terrific author who happens to be married to Stephen King. I enjoyed all her nice,s and her one nonfiction book.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDelete@Rex bEsTS before FEATS at 6D was my only overwrite.
Besides SCYTALE (40D) and TABITHA (26D), NITER (48D) was also a WOE.
Rex -
ReplyDeleteThe asteroid that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs - about 65 million years ago - is considered by many evolutionary biologists to be the most important event (like, ever) in the evolution of mammals. Since we’re the “alpha” species, and we are really just fancy mammals (with all the available “upgrades”), without Chixulub, there would be no hominids, no humans, and the world would still be pristine but savage - take your pick (I go with pristine - it’s pretty savage as ir is).
See Wikipedia entry below.
I.M.O., the whole “center of gravity” of the puzzle IS the asteroid!
Seasons greetings,
Bill Lambos
Self-proclaimed “Wizard of CrossWorld”
———
The Chicxulub crater (IPA: [t͡ʃikʃuˈluɓ] ⓘ) is an impact crater buried underneath the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. Its center is offshore, but the crater is named after the onshore community of Chicxulub Pueblo.[3] It was formed slightly over 66 million years ago when a large asteroid, about ten kilometers (six miles) in diameter, struck Earth. The crater is estimated to be 180 kilometers (110 miles) in diameter and 20 kilometers (12 miles) in depth. It is the second largest confirmed impact structure on Earth, and the only one whose peak ring is intact and directly accessible for scientific research.[4]
——-
Tabitha King is Stephen King's wife, and (as seen today), also an author! Some of their progeny are also authors. Very literary family. 😁
ReplyDeleteHard for a Wedensday, with SCYTALE being the biggest WoE. I could picture the device, but could not come up with a name for it. Did not know TABITHA or IRV.
ReplyDeleteTRI/TRE/TROU.
I like the theme.
Some weirdly interesting fill here and there but overall this was not a fully realized puzzle. The theme was disjoint - Rex highlights the ASTEROID - revealer issue. 30 years ago my son was big into dinosaurs so by osmosis I could complete the shaded boxes - but uninterested other than that.
ReplyDeleteFEATS don’t fail me now
No clue on TABITHA - NITER, SCYTALE and OTTO are borderline bad. Minor shoe subtheme and liked seeing ST FRANCIS and LEBRON.
Solve was pleasant enough I guess - but I got that “should have been more” feeling at the end.
KK
This one played hard for me. Got through it but in way above-average time. SCYTALE and PRITZKER don’t strike me as average Wednesday words. Still, I liked the theme and it helped the solve, once I got it. Need to look up NITER.
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw BRON TO, I thought, “Hmm, dinosaurs?” I did not have any of the other behemoths by the time I got to the revealer, and with a couple of crossing letters, I saw the one-word THESAURUS. Then I saw the two-word THE SAURUS and was utterly delighted. And then it was fun getting the others, especially since I was a dinosaur fanatic as a kid. I didn’t see the ASTEROID cutting the dinos in two, I just thought it was a clever punny addition to the theme, and of course the only way to make dinosaur names not be dinosaur names is to split them across words.
ReplyDeleteThere was a bit of a bonus theme answer with HORNS. The clue (“feature of many ceratopsians”) probably sounded like gibberish to most, but I thought of “triceratops” so it had to be HORNS. and that was before I knew there was a dino-theme.
I thought there might be a problem that BRONTOSAURUS was renamed ALLOSAURUS, but I looked it up and I was wrong. It is true that BRONTOSAURUS is no longer used. Paleontologists decided that it and Apatosaurus were really the same beast so they dropped BRONTO because Apatosaurus was named first. So no foul there unless you object because BRONTOSAURUS is no longer used. It died out in more ways than one.
Some nice misdirect clues for AUGER, SPIES and TROU. (I don’t agree that the latter should be “dropped” from word lists. Get it?)
Mini-theme of comfy shoes with SLIP-ONS and LOAFER. Like another extinct dinosaur, Ward Cleaver, the TYRANNO SAURUS liked to change into slip-on loafers after a long day at the office. With a cocktail that he was unable to lift to his lips. Sigh.
Hard. And annoying. ADESTE, NITER, SCYTALE?? On a Wednesday (If ever)? No.
ReplyDeleteThere was some crazy obscure stuff in here (meaning, I didn’t know them, with the inglorious SCYTALE leading the pack), but somehow I got through this with no Naticks, so therefore the crosses were officially fair. I would be happy never to see SCYTALE again. But the revealer was super cute!
ReplyDeleteNot one but two Beethoven clues. Oh, the joy!
ReplyDeleteWanderlust: Ditto for the HORNS clue. And sweet to see TRI crossing the answer.
My five favorite original clues from last week
ReplyDelete(in order of appearance):
1. Result of some spinning
2. Brown in strips (7)
3. Delivery site (5)
4. Letters that make a long story short? (3)
5. Telenova profession (2)(3)
COCOON
CHARLIE
PORCH
TMI
TE AMO
Brontosaurus has been resurrected as a dino name ... or not, depending on which classification you believe. Many paleontologists recognize two genera, Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus; others lump them all into Apatosaurus.
ReplyDeleteSee here for more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4393826/
Thanks Kitshef for the clarification about Brontosaurus and Allosaurus. I heard that Brontosaurus was in use again but I didn’t realize that it depends on which expert you ask!
DeleteTo be fair, it is amazing what scientists learn from fossils from the Age of Dinosaurs.
Except for Allosaurus I knew all these words when I was going through the dinosaur stage as a kid. ( I had a plastic T Rex in the now considered wrong upright position, for years).
Saw we were doing a dinosaur thing after BRON TO and ST EGO and I thought the THESAURUS connection was brilliant. I guess needing SCYTALE to make this all work is the price that is paid, but I have to say it's a word I have never seen or heard of in crosswords or anywhere else. Today's learning experience.
ReplyDeleteNot much flow to this one as the corners were isolated. I didn't know PHIL but __HIL made that one inevitable. Anyone else remember Joe ISUZU? And strangely enough, if you asked me the name of the first dog in space, I would have said LAIKA instantly. Don't ask me what day it is though.
Really clever theme, KA. Knew Almost everything and thought there was some straining to make it all work, but a worthy achievement nonetheless. Thanks for all the fun.
Hey All !
ReplyDeleteI'm still wondering why the Dinos are split. The Blockers that split the names have no significance to the Theme. Unless you go the ASTEROID "split" them from Earth? Do I need a SCYTALE to figure it out?
Did get a chuckle out of the literal Revealer. Kinda wacky the two "Revealers" are asymmetrical.
Aren't humans today closer in time to the TYRANNO than the TYRANNO to the first dinoSAURS, or something? Fascinating stuff.
Nice F fest in bottom-center. Speaking of which, I'd bet 99% put in SEMPER for ADESTE. My last letter was the A cross of SCYTALE/ADESTE. Man, Natick Alert! Could've been any vowel.
Wednesday already. Time flies when you have Monday off!
Five F's
RooMonster
DarrinV
Nope on semper. Too close to Christmas
DeleteUnenjoyable slog rife with guess work and unsatisfying answers.
ReplyDeleteWe live across the street from a Catholic church named for a MARTYR, where I'm sure they sang ADESTE Fidelis to welcome KRIS Kringle.
ReplyDeleteGot ASTEROID off the I in LICIT so figured it would be an Atari theme, but THE SAURUS cleared that up. A puzzle my kids would have liked when they were young, and actually SCYTALE is right up the older one's alley; he of the cryptography website and all.
@Pablo LMAO Joe Isuzu!!
I don’t understand the clue for 55 across
ReplyDeleteKris Kristofferson (singer)
DeleteFrom the Dune Wiki: Scytale [d. 10210 AG] was a Face Dancer of the Bene Tleilax, and later the youngest Masheikh and the last Tleilaxu Master, who played a prominent role in major historical events that spanned more than five thousand years.
ReplyDeleteIf you're up on your SAURUSes, this puzzle may hit your wheelhouse. If you're not especially, like me, it may sail right over your head.
ReplyDeleteSTE-GO was baffling me from the get-go. And after I got to the clever revealer, it still baffled me. There's a STEGOSAURUS? There's an ALLOSAURUS?
But I have heard of the BRONTOSAURUS and the TYRANNOSAURUS, so there's that.
What on earth is SCYTALE? Forgot to check if that's even the right answer.
I admire the cleverness and originality of the theme, but, alas, I didn't find the puzzle especially entertaining to solve.
When I read the clue for scytale I remembered that I had seen this concept, probably learned about it in school when I was young, but there was no way in hell I was going to come up with the name anymore. Got it completely from crosses.
ReplyDeleteWould have had a tougher time without the dinosaur names in the shaded boxes. With them it played easy for me.
DNF. SCYTALE/ADESTE/NITER. Just brutal for me. Is this really fair for a Wednesday??? Not a clue about any of these, and crossing ADESTE with those two seems cruel.
ReplyDeleteH-shaped triple natick, for the loss. Simpatico.
DeleteI loved the joke - got a (silent) bark of laughter from me [nod to the holiday pets]. For me, the ASTEROID "destruction" was a bonus, and thank you to @Wanderlust and @Andy Freude for pointing out that the triceratops is in there, too, via its HORNS and the clue...and also the TRI(athaton). Another bonus was learning SCYTALE (I think the dictionary is telling me to pronounce it SKY-ta-lee), a word I don't recall ever seeing and a device interesting to learn about, possibly of use to SPIES.
ReplyDelete@Andy Freude - I can understand your joy at the two Beethoven references :)
I didn't notice the theme until I got to the revealer. In fact, after getting ASTEROID my first shaded squares were at the end of ALARMIST, which I thought you might call someone predicting an asteroid impact, but that didn't PAN OUT (I phrase I've only ever heard in the negative, btw). I was happy when I figured out.
ReplyDeleteBut SCYTALE? It's unknown to Dictionary.com, but it does have its own Wikipedia article,but sheesh! I needed all the crosses for that one, whereas I could guess the final A in TABITHA and the final V in IRV, unless there's something called RSaP.
At least I learned what an ANTIGEN is.
You’re right… nowadays, PAN OUT tends to be used in statements like “This theme didn’t really pan out”, meaning live up to its potential. Or maybe it’s always been like that? I presume this came from expressions used by 19th century gold prospectors. Surely, then as now, it was used for successful outcomes as well. Interesting.
Delete“hope everything pans out with your job search” etc etc.
DeleteTHESAURUS!
ReplyDeleteThe entire SE section is (in my opinion, others may thrive on this stuff) an excellent example of the NYT at their arcane, trivia-testing, sleep-inducing best. The crosses have a nice touch starting it off with the requisite yet still benign TRE, then it kicks right into overdrive with Modern Family DAVE, a nice TREVI from Rome, our good friend Van Gough gets a nod, ISUZU, and a tribute to The Outlaws (KRIS Kristofferson) - wow. But Wait ! Not to be outdone, the downs kick in with PROTZKER (!), ELISE, and the world-renowned IRV Gotti ! Congrats to the NYT editorial team - you have really outdone yourself today.
ReplyDeleteIt appears as though I may just have a minor philosophical disagreement with the NYT’s approach to crosswords.
Defintion of feat from "oxford Languages"
ReplyDeletean achievement that requires great courage, skill, or strength.
"the new printing presses were considerable feats of engineering"
I call that Guinness material
Fun theme--but I was basically lost in Natick on this one. SCYT_LE/_DESTE, no idea. PRITZ_ER/_R_S/_RV. Erm. . . Nope. I rather enjoy Mr. ___tofferson too.
ReplyDeleteWe got a ST FRANCIS and a "ST EGO." (Shouldn't there be an abbreviation in the clue for the answer to be abbreviated?)
@kitsef you got TRI/TRE/TROU but missed TREVI.
Yet another trivia fest with endless obscure proper nouns. I hated this. Terrible fill.
ReplyDeleteI went to the Deutsches Museum in Munich once. It was dedicated to FEATS of engineering. It had many, many rooms, full of machines of all sorts (including ancient musical instruments, the reason I went -- I have a clavichord I commissioned after an anonymous 17th century one in their collection).One room was of encryption devices. There was indeed a SCYTALE. And an enigma machine. And many other things. It was a very German museum, in the cafeteria afterward I feasted on a big plate of wurst and kraut with a big stein of bier. Never saw anything like it anywhere else, except maybe the Henry Ford Museum in Michigan, which was not nearly as well curated.
ReplyDelete+1 for not being able to get the SCYTALE/ADESTE/NITER crosses on my own. Wah wah.
ReplyDeleteVan Gogh, as he slipped farther and farther into mental illness, said his greatest masterpiece was when "IRISES for more than a few minutes before I goes back to bed."
ReplyDeleteA little slower than usual for a Wednesday. When the wife asked why it took so long, I pointed at the puzzle and said "Therein lies a SCYTALE."
Show me the country with the lowest median age and I'll show you AFRICAn young country.
I'm reliving my Dino fixation from my youth with my 6 year old granddaughter. Great fun! Thanks, Kareem Ayas.
Didn't particularly care for this, but it reminded me of the Sinclair Oil pavilion at the 1964/1965 Worlds Fair. It was one of my faves to visit. You could insert money in a machine that dispensed plastic dinosaurs in
ReplyDeletedifferent colors. I had a green triceratops and a bronze T-rex. My brother got a stegosaurus and a brontosaurus. I think maybe we had a couple of others.
I wish A.P. answers would be banned from the puzzle. It's such lazy fill. You can turn any school subject into a nonsense word by sticking AP in front of it. It's become a plague at the Times.
Baby I'm Scared Of You
I liked the King James clue following a book of the bible one.
ReplyDeleteI like Andy FREUDE's ode to JOY in the comments.
"Life on Earth", a series on Netflix narrated by Morgan Freeman, has a devastating re-enactment of the asteroid impact and its effects on the planet. Very interesting to visit lots of eras in the planets history besides the dinosaurs.
Classic Rex long opening paragraph theme overthink:) - as well as wit, humor and humanity.
Very tough for me with the bottom half generating most of the difficulty. Did not know SCYTALE, PRITZKER, TABITHA, and NITER (as clued)…yew before ELM and unite>Marry>MERGE..KRIS with a c at first..IRV and PHIL were late showing up…tough bottom half.
ReplyDeleteAmusing and very clever, liked it.
Nice solid Wednesday, liked theme, didn't mind ASTEROID at all, I'm simple minded
ReplyDeleteProbably would've been easy, but I was convinced the coded message toughie was CODEX , which I remembered from The DaVinci Code. Like RP, got distracted there. I kept trying to fit an X in somehow, but eventually got it right since crosses were pretty easy
Keep the pix coming!
Great debut! Clever. Overthink much, Rex?
ReplyDeleteAgree! Clever, breezy and fun! "Asteroid" came late for me and was a wonderful "AHA!" It tied together what was otherwise Dinosaur Types.
DeleteIs it ironic or just me that no one has mentioned the missing Rex for Tyrannosaurus Rex on the Rex Parker blog? Hmm...
ReplyDeleteI usually look forward to the puzzle - NOT THIS ONE!
ReplyDeleteDinothesauruses! thUmbsUp, on the theme, with that cool 33-D revealer.
ReplyDelete@Muse darlin no doubt woulda had a primo avatar-of-the-day for this rodeo.
no-knows weren't too bad, at our house. Just mainly:
1. SCYTALESAURUS.
2. TABITHASAURUS.
3. IRV-O-SAURUS.
staff weeject pick: RBS. Plural abbreve meat, plus darn near a gimme(s).
fave SAURUS: MARTYR+ANNOTATE Rex.
Not too much fight in the solvequest, until reachin that there SCYTALE epoch, where the dinos at least helped pitch in, as crossers. (Cuz by then BRONTO & STEGO had kinda clued m&e in.)
Thanx for the seismic solvequest, Mr. Ayas dude. And congratz on yer high-saurin' debut. Darn near scy-high, but therein lies a tale...
Masked & Anonymo6Us
**gruntz**
The NE and SW corners were a little tough, but the rest was an absolute breeze. Solved in half the time of yesterday’s utter slog. I’m convinced that in midweek puzzles (Tue-Thu) what makes one hard or easy really revolves around how you click with the creator’s clueing style.
ReplyDeleteWasn’t the object of the plot in The DaVinci Code a Scytale? I remember Tom Hanks and Ian MacKellan grappling for some such thing.
ReplyDeleteObscure, for sure, Otherwise, a fun Wed puzzle!
Omg I thought this same thing and kept trying to remember what it was called, as it was sure it was this — but apparently that was a “cryptex,” and apparently it’s not even a real thing! Haha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptex
DeleteI've long suspected that AP (advanced placement) courses are some kind of administrative stratagem to finagle credit for both high schools and COLLEGES so that they both get funds from state and federal agencies for teaching one course. What's next, APPE?
ReplyDeleteI did major side eye to RIVET as the answer to 34D "It helps keep a tight ship tight". RIVETs haven't been used in ship construction since at least the 1960s. Advances in metallurgy and welding techniques have made them obsolete. RIVETs are still used in many applications but ship building isn't one of them.
Life has gotten much better since I stopped watching or listening to news programs. I just check the headlines in the NYT to see if an ASTEROID is headed our way. If not then I move on to the crossword.
I was quite tired last night; maybe that is why this seemed a bit challenging for a Wednesday. That whole SCYTALE ADESTE NITER area was brutal! Fortunately I used to work in architecture so PRITZKER was a nice gimme.
ReplyDeleteXmas was great, although snowless. I entered my nephew's new house to see he had covered the entire kitchen island with a vinyl tablecloth and a few colored markers. Already written were some greetings like "Welcome Shawna!" (his son's fiance's sister from England). I thought: what a great but weird idea! Turns out the tablecloth was covering a piece of plywood, as they are renovating and the new countertop wasn't ready. But we had a remarkable amount of fun drawing and writing on it. Later in the evening, every time someone said something funny we would write it down. And because we were all drinking, a lot of things seemed funny.
[No Spelling Bee yd cuz too tired but: my streak in Dordle reached 200!]
I can’t put my finger on why, but I didn’t enjoy doing this one at all. Maybe I have not understood the significance , if any. of the place where the names were chopped up; the importance of the black squares ; and, if any, the relevance of the names of the dinosaurs. I did learn something—horned animals like dinosaurs are “beaked.”
ReplyDelete@gfrpeace (10:48). You remind me of the Bayernhof Music Museum in Pittsburgh. Major collection of automated musical instruments from the 19th and 20th centuries, in an unusual German-style mansion. Some one-of-a-kinds.
ReplyDeleteMedium for a Wednesday? NOT. Looking back over it now I'm not sure why it was so difficult. I had never heard of Tabitha King, nor of Scytale (which I'lm about to look up) nor the architects award
ReplyDeleteI'm still not sure what the clue for 13D "seism" is saying. Oh yeah, I could not remember Laika, but that's a pretty famous name.
I did, however find it so difficult that I was expecting a dif. ruing for a Wednesday.
Thx Kareem; a fine piece of work! 😊
ReplyDeleteMed (downs-o).
Took a while for the impact of the ASTEROID (which I got early on) to sink in, twigging THESAUR(i)S, and helping greatly with the solve. My spelling often suffers from not seeing words written out, esp the downs.
All was good except for the 'K' in LAIKA (altho inferable, compared to 'd' or 'b'), and the end of PRITZKER; hence only SOP was correct in the SE.
UnitE before MERGE. Stephen before TABITHA (of whom I know, but haven't read).
Fun adventure in downs-o land; very enjoyable challenge! :)
___
Paolo Pasco's New Yorker Mon. is med (so far, at 3 NYT Sats); stymied at the cross of the 'Globe Theatre' / 'magic pasta pot' [update: guessed correctly, and learned two new things]. Still working on Sunday's downs-o (7 hrs in); only two tricky areas remaining. On to Stan Newman's Mon. Stumper 🤞, with Patrick Berry's New Yorker cryptic on deck for tm.
___
Peace 🕊 🇺🇦 ~ Compassion ~ Tolerance ~ Kindness ~ Freudenfreude & a DAP to all 👊 🙏
@Joe Dipinto. My second-earliest memory is of the dinosaurs at the 1964-5 World's Fair, which was tremendous fun. We bought a great book there with very dynamic artist's renderings of dinosaurs, which alas is long gone. We stayed in a hotel - an experience in itself - and I remember hearing my heartbeat in my ears but thinking it was brontosaurus footsteps.
ReplyDeleteMy earliest memory is being in the hospital with gastroenteritis. That was less fun.
Scytale x adeste did me in. Had to cheat to finish. :/
ReplyDeleteHaven’t read the comments yet, but Rex criticized the answer FEATS. That puzzles me Feats has a connotation of a great accomplishment not just any action. Fits well with the Guinness book of records. A lot of feats there!
ReplyDeleteI thought the puzzle was OK. The theme helped me get some of the obscure stuff. I did have to get every cross for scytale! (Autocorrect wanted scythe).
In case some of y'all aren't already aware of this, phrases like 28A PAN OUT and "Hit paydirt" originated from a method of looking for gold. A scoop of sediment and some water from a creek or stream bed would be put in a shallow container or PAN and swirled around. Lighter elements would wash out over the edges of the pan leaving behind heavier elements. Gold is relatively heavy so if the sediment had any it would be paydirt and the gold would remain as one of the last things to PAN OUT. So a question like "How did it PAN OUT today?" might be answered "Great! I hit paydirt!"
ReplyDelete@kitshef 2:01. "We bought a great book there with very dynamic artist's renderings of dinosaurs, which alas is long gone."
ReplyDeleteI share your sentiment but your grammar needs help. Should be "..... which alas are long gone."
@egs -- @kitshef's grammar is absolutely correct. The thing that's "long gone" and is the subject of the verb "to be" is the book, not the artist's renderings.
ReplyDeleteI delayed doing this (or trying to, anyway) until today (Thurs). Big mistake. I shouldn't have tried to do it at all. Not worth the time and effort. Worst in quite a while, but this category is filling up rapidly.
ReplyDeleteThe site ate my comment, which is probably just as well. This mess was a complete waste of time. Worst in quite a while, but, as I wrote earlier, this category is filling up rapidly.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the John Prine song! I’ve been a fan since the early 70’s, and I’m not sure I’ve heard that one before.
ReplyDeleteWow. An English prof (!) who doesn't know who Tabitha (Mrs. Stephen) King is. W-o-w.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, nice theme & execution. It's as if the animals were cut in two by the SEISM. A theme lagniappe with the clue for HORNS.
New word learned: SCYTALE. Fair crosses, so a Wednesday pass. Writeover: bEsTS before FEATS. Clue misprint in my paper: "One daying [sic] for a cause." Luckily, with the -TYR ending, there could be no doubt.
Let us make TABITHA our DOD. If she's good enough for Steve, she's good enough for me. Birdie.
Wordle par.
ACTS, FEATS, ETC.
ReplyDeleteTABITHA is a COLLEGE GAL,
"HORNS OUT!", her ALARMIST cry.
NO LOAFER nor lack OF EFFORT, pal,
SCAREDOF nothing she might TRI.
--- FRANCIS SCOT PRITZKER
KRIS KRIS. Duh! And even after I, I, got the King James answer. Oh the humanity.
ReplyDelete(yeah, dnf)
But...got the dino theme, tho not all were correctly filled in.
Diana, Lady-in-Waiting for Crosswords
Another first timer that badly needed editing but didn’t get any. Next!
ReplyDeleteVery very easy Wednesday, even with the completely unknown SCYTALE, since the crosses were basically gimmes. Loved dinosaurs when I was a kid, and my brother and I had lots of them! I'm surprised by how many didn't know ADESTE Fideles! It's been a Christmas classic for over 200 years, sung by choirs everywhere around the world. It's probably heard more often in English nowadays than Latin, but it's often sung in both languages by choirs. First in one language, then followed by the other language.
ReplyDeleteOh, and to follow up on SCYTALE, there was one site that had five variations on the pronunciation of this word . I guess there's no wrong way to pronounce it.
ReplyDeleteClue 44 across "One daying for a cause" . Daying? Am I missing something here?
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteWell, the Universal Xword wasn't any better. ELISE must have been quite a GAL.
Wordle par.
To anonymous 5:15 pm: Your paper must have had a misprint. My paper reads 44A - One dying for a cause
ReplyDelete