This is the eleventh Rasmus Rask puzzle, devoted to the original Mr. Charming Scandinavian Linguist. The puzzle is similar to a crossword puzzle, in that there is a grid for filling in words and phrases, and clues for the ACROSS and DOWN directions. However, all the squares in a Rasmus Rask puzzle are filled with letters, and the answers to the clues may (but are not required to) overlap. Clues for a particular row or column are given together, in the order they appear in the grid. No indication of the amount of overlap between clues is given. Letters spelling out RASMUS RASK in a diamond shape are given to provide a framework for filling in the answers.
Complete the puzzle and send your solutions to the editors of SpecGram by April 15th, 2021 and you could win a prize. The correct solution and winners, if any, will be announced in the upcoming May issue.
| 0 | 1 | 2 R | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| 1 | K | A | |||
| 2 S | S | ||||
| 3 | A | M | |||
| 4 | R | U | |||
| 5 | S |
• Also known as the quadratic mean (abbrev).
• An atypical-
• A noticeably less cute cousin of a puffin.
• Abbreviation for a successful L2 learner, or either aspartame or sucralose.
• A Latinate affirmative that may appear unadorned, or with acute or grave accent, depending on the language in which it appears.
• The homophonous correction that made Johnny wonder how many pancakes he’d et.
• Just about there on the [be barren roil with life] continuum.
• Informant? Consultant? ______-
] – RE
• That which one attempts to connect upside down more often than is theoretically possible, statistically speaking.
• A measure common to pulse and tempo (abbrev).
• Proto-
• An interjection indicating amazement in Portugese, Spanish, and (modulo diacritics) Esperanto; likely a phonetic calque from English.
• ISO 3166 code for the country of first item in this group.
• An item in a dictionary, lexicon, or encyclopædia.
• Middle English article cognate and homographous with a Scots numeral.
• Goidelic lake home to a famous cryptid.
• Obsolete emphatic first person pronoun used by the likes of Shakespeare and Milton.
The answers to March’s “Onomastic Destiny ♂”
In an unexpected turn of events, being featured in the Onomastic Destiny puzzle has brought some positive attention to the works of some of the participants. Prof. Gilmartin recently published an interesting paper on the Smiling Ritual, about how introverts interact in the hallway while trying to avoid small talk, and an uninteresting paper on the Singular Limit, a misguided attempt to find out where pluralization sets in between the numbers one and two. Prof. Ingram’s most recent paper on the Mars Genitive in xenolinguistics, speculates on the case system that hypothesized ancient inhabitants of the red planet may have used.
This positive effect is not limited to male participants. A number of women featured in Onomastic Destiny ♀ have also received positive attention to their work. Prof. Gilchrist has published a paper on Collating Irish, which demonstrates that proper grouping and ordering can further illuminate the history of Celtic languages. Prof. Mastroianni has published on the International Chasm in the quality of automaticity afforded minority languages.
Back to the matter at hand, each of the puzzlemeisters below were able to untangle the puzzle answers, and will receive some moderately desirable SpecGram merch:
Steve Paulic • Mara Ingram • Luca Dinu • Vincent Fish
In addition, the following puzzlers have achieved the everlasting glory that comes with an honorable mention:
Pat Calles • Hilda Osborne • Chas Skutt • Emily Barbosa