9 October 5 Saturday
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.
2 across A sudden flood of e.g. river water, burglaries. 5 letters
4 across Unwise. 7 letters
5 across Mark of punctuation. 5 letters
1 down Former name for Iran. 6 letters
2 down Lazy, drooping posture. 6 letters
3 down Apparently effortless skill or style. 6 letters
10 October 3
These words have very similar meaning but they are not the same — can you show the difference?
Read each of these words out aloud, varying the intonation. Explain how your intonation adds shades of meaning.
If you are doing this with someone else, one of you can say the word and the other can try to describe the mood.
1 Yes. No. Again.
2 Try. Tomorrow. Never.
3 Goodbye. Well. Now.
4 Chocolate. Sorry. Oh.
Questioning. Doubting. Affirming. Denying. Angry. Pleading. Soothing. Annoyed. Impatient. Offended. Outraged. Pleased. Excited.
11 October 3
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 Brave.
2 Foolhardy.
3 Valiant.
See also Confusables.
12 October 1
When the Reformers sold off the treasures of Durham Cathedral, they sold a priceless piece of Scottish history into oblivion.
I recently added this post, The Black Rood of Scotland.
It comes from The Rites of Durham, a look back at the abbey at Durham Cathedral as it was before the Protestant Reformation that began with Henry VIII’s break with Rome in 1534. The Rites was written by an anonymous author in 1593; however, for this extract I have used an edition made in 1671, because it has more modern spelling and vocabulary.
This particular passage has to do with the Battle of Neville’s Cross, in which English forces repelled a Scottish invasion on October 17th, 1346, at Redhills just west of Durham. King David II of Scotland carried a priceless relic, the Black Rood, into the battle. The author of the Rites recounts the legend of how David came to possess it, and then goes on to tell us what happened to it after the battle, and why.
Composition
Join each group of ideas together into one sentence in at least two different ways, using different words as much as you can.
1 David fought in the Battle of Neville’s Cross. He wore the Black Rood on his breast. He hoped it would protect him.
2 A stag menaced David. He raised his hands. A cross appeared in them. The stag vanished.
3 David built an abbey. He put the Black Rood in it. He named the abbey Holyrood.
13 October 1
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.
14 September 27
A short prayer for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross on September 14th/27th each year, from the Sarum Missal.
Holy Cross Day is the name given in the Book of Common Prayer to the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, which is kept on September 14th. In The Rites of Durham (1593) it is still called Holy Rood Day, after the Anglo-Saxon manner.
The feast goes back to the fourth century, when Helen, dowager Empress of Constantinople, declared that the true Cross of Christ had been found. The relic was treasured up in a silver casket in the newly consecrated Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (AD 335), and brought out for display and veneration every year on this date. See St Helen Finds the True Cross in The Copy Book.
The prayer below is the Collect for this day according to the Sarum Use, the liturgy of the English Church prior to the Reformation in the sixteenth century.
Collect
O GOD, Who wast pleased to redeem mankind with the precious Blood of Thy Only Begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, mercifully grant that they who draw nigh to adore the life-giving Cross may be set free from the bonds of their sins. Amen.