BIG MONDAY CROSSWORD

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Aromatic yellow-flowered herb related to dill; Foeniculum vulgare (6)

Aviation service of the Royal Navy, formed as part of the RAF in 1924 (5,3,3)

Instrument for measuring the distance travelled by a wheeled vehicle (8)

Character played by Peter Graves on TV’s Mission: Impossible from 1967 to 1973 (3,6)

Short musical composition designed to test or display a player’s skill; French, ‘study’ (5)

Official language of Ethiopia, belonging to the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family (7)

Fourth novel in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, published in 1987 (4)

Small constellation of the southern hemisphere near Orion and Columba; the Hare (5)

Country of West Africa bordered by Ghana, Benin and Burkina Faso (4)

La La Land star named Best Actress at the 2017 BAFTAs (4,5)

Former German currency unit equal to one hundredth of a mark (7)

Plant genus of the family Zingiberaceae that includes zeodary and turmeric (7)

1851 opera by Giuseppe Verdi based on the Victor Hugo play Le Roi s’amuse (1832) (9)

2016 Australian film starring Dev Patel, Rooney Mara and Nicole Kidman (4)

Monarch’s representative in an

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Anglo-Saxon shire, generally ranked lower than the ealdorman (5)

2012 historical drama film starring Ben Affleck and Bryan Cranston (4)

Slender long-tailed monkey considered sacred in India; Presbytis entellus (7)

Port city of NE Brazil, capital of Rio Grande do Norte state (5)

British tea clipper launched in 1869, now preserved as a museum ship at Greenwich, London (5,4)

Ductile silvery-white metallic element of the lanthanide group isolated in 1901; atomic no. 63 (8)

Protagonist of the 1948 Graham Greene novel The Heart of the Matter (5,6)

Canton of southern Switzerland on the border with Italy; capital, Bellinzona (6)

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City on the Arno River in west central Italy, the capital of Tuscany (8)

In-character memoir published by Steve Coogan’s Alan Partridge in 2016 (5)

Principal currency unit of Lesotho, equal to 100 lisente (4)

Internet discussion board for participants with common interests (5)

Quotation at the beginning of a book or chapter usually related to its theme (8)

1989 Andrew Lloyd Webber musical based on a 1955 novel by British author David Garnett (7,2,4)

Genus of plants of the knotgrass

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family that includes rhubarb (5)

Actor who played Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter film series (2001-11) (6,5)

Alex ___, US author of novels including Roots: The Saga of an American Family (1976) (5)

15-book work by the Roman poet Ovid (43 BC-AD 17) retelling Greek and Roman myths in dactylic hexameter (13)

Any large diurnal bird of prey of the family that includes the kestrels (6)

Biff ___, character played by Thomas F. Wilson in the Back to the Future film trilogy (1985-90) (6)

Cabaret in Montmartre, Paris, founded by Charles Zidler and Joseph Oller in 1889 (6,5)

‘So I awoke, and behold it was a ___’ John Bunyan The Pilgrim’s Progress (1678) (5)

Character played by Pete Ploszek in 2016’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (8)

Popular Neapolitan song written by Giovanni Capurro (words) and Eduardo di Capua (music) in 1898 (1,4,3)

Father of Portly in Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows (5)

Winner of Record, Album and Song of the Year at the 2017 Grammy Awards (5)

Clear jelly made from meat or fish stock, used as a mould in savoury dishes (5)

Sweetness designation applied to sparkling white wine containing 0-12 grams of sugar per litre (4)

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