Welcome to the Clay Lane blog
This page keeps you up-to-date with recent additions, alerts you to posts you may have missed, and invites you to tackle exercises similar to those NL Clay gave to pupils aged 12-13 in the 1930s.
1 Today September 6
An Irish princess fled to Cumbria to escape the Vikings, clutching her precious silver bracelet.
September 6 os
St Bega gave her name to the former Priory at St Bees, on the Cumbrian coast. Later biographers buried her life under conventional mediaeval romance, and confused her with St Begu, founder of a monastery at Hartlepool in the 7th century. But beneath it all lies a ninth-century Irish princess, and a mysterious bracelet.
Make as many words as you can by adding vowels (AEIOU) to these consonants.
dtd (5)
audited. dated. dieted. doted. edited.
2 Yesterday September 18
The Blues, the Greens and Belisarius
Samuel Goodrich tells the story of the Nika Rebellion in AD 532.
I recently added this post, The Blues, the Greens, and Belisarius.
This is the story, told here by American author Samuel Goodrich, of the Nika Rebellion in AD 532, named after the repeated cry of the rebels: Nika! Conquer! The revolt broke out after two sets of rival sports fans in Constantinople, the capital of the Roman Empire, suddenly made common cause against the Emperor, Justinian. Fortunately, he had the rising young general Belisarius on his side, and even more fortunately Justinian’s wife Theodora thought of bringing him in.
Composition
Join each group of ideas together into one sentence, in at least two different ways.
1 Justinian was a Blues fan. The Blues turned against him.
2 The rebels demanded Justinian resign. Theodora told him to refuse.
3 Justinian could not control the rebels. Theodora asked Belisarius to help.
3 Yesterday September 18
Find a single adjective to describe ‘what cannot be’.
Exercises of this kind were set in School Certificate English Practice (1933) by NL Clay.
What can’t be stopped is unstoppable, what can’t be shaken is unshakeable, and what can’t be divided is indivisible. See if you can continue the pattern with these words.
That which cannot
1 be believed is ...
2 be eaten is ...
3 be wounded is ...
Variations
See if you can think of three similar examples of your own. Start with the adjective, e.g. unbreakable. Visit Impossible Adjectives for more.
4 September 14 Saturday
A stray cat helps the Red Army to baffle the advancing Nazis.
I recently added this post, The Story of Miss.
It is my own version of events during the Second World War; the essential facts come originally from Soviet War News. It all happened as part of the blockade organised by Germany and Finland on Russia’s northwest from the summer of 1941, when the USSR joined the British Empire’s resistance to Nazi Germany (the USA was still neutral at this point). The star of the story is a stray cat.
Composition
Join each group of ideas together into one sentence, in at least two different ways.
1 The Russians erected telephone lines. The Germans shot them down. This happened repeatedly.
2 They tried to bury the lines. The ground was stony. They could not dig.
3 Nikolai saw a manhole. He thought of the water mains. He imagined using them for the wires.
5 September 14 Saturday
Make as many words as you can using the letters of one nine-letter word. Can you beat our score?
I have added a new Polyword to the collection.
Make as many words as you can using only the nine letters you are given below. Your words should all be four letters or more in length, and they should all contain the letter highlighted in the centre of the grid. You may not use the same letter twice. There is one nine-letter word to find.
6 September 9
These words have very similar meaning but they are not the same — can you show the difference?
To what extent are these words synonymous? Give examples.
1 Isolated. Lonely. Remote.
2 Break. Fracture. Snap.
3 Doodle. Draw. Sketch.
7 September 4
Fill the empty boxes with letters, using the clues to help you find the right ones.
A new crossword for the collection.
Fill the empty boxes with letters to make words running across and down. Use the numbered clues to help you find the right words. Click any box to get started.
1 across Pass along like fast-moving clouds. 4 letters
4 across Sunrise. 4 letters
6 across Very powerful and harmful in effect, like a disease. 8 letters
7 across A spendthrift, one who throws away his money. 8 letters
2 down (Of an act) hidden, done amid secrecy. 6 letters
3 down Mock scornfully. 6 letters
4 down Flood. 6 letters
5 down Extract something with difficulty, as if from a shell; Nathaniel ______, a character in Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens. 6 letters