CISRA Puzzle Competition 2011 - Solutions
2C. Third Degree
As hinted by the puzzle title, the puzzle layout, or may be determined from trial and error clue solving, answers to the clues come in sets of three words that sound like three degrees of comparison. The full set of answers are:
Pouch purse Ship's financial officer purser Last persist Blackbeard Teach Coach teacher Wooden case teachest Beautiful woman belle Hungarian composer Béla Weight for stability ballast Friend pal Wanness pallor Housed royally palaced Operating on Esteem honour Sincere honest Academic teacher (abbr) prof Put forth for acceptance proffer Self-acknowledged professed Stabiliser fin Rorqual finner Did skilfully finessed Rip tear Earth terra Formed into a series of levels terraced Duke of Sto Helit Mort Artillery mortar Fitted some wood via a projection and a hole mortised Ruckus din Main meal dinner Hereditary ruler dynast Military body corps Device for removing part of a fruit corer Sang in unison chorused Tone note Thoracic terga of insects nota Observed noticed
Each set of answers can be fitted into a unique row of the puzzle grid, as follows:
purSer persIst Purse
teacHer teacheSt teAch
bAllast beLle Bela
Pal pAllor paLaced
honEst oN hOnour
prOffer professeD Prof
Finessed fiN fInner
teAr terrA terraCed
mortiseD morT mortAr
dIn dInner dynaSt
Corer chOrused corpS
notE Nota nOticed
While the first word in each triad does not necessarily appear in the first column, the order is consistently left-to-right, wrapping around at the end. The letters in the red boxes spell out a final set of three clues, which, together with their answers, are:
Shape of a dice* cube Island nation Cuba Pablo Picasso cubist
The two accepted solutions to the puzzle are CUBE (being both the "root word" of each final answer, and another name for the power of the function otherwise known as a third-degree polynomial) and CUBIST (being the "third degree" in the final set of comparative degrees).
* Yes, we know the singular is "die".