Decoding a Peculiar Crossword Clue
Welcome, fellow solvers, to the grid! Today, we’re sharpening our pencils and our wits on a particularly delightful seven-letter challenge that recently crossed my path. It’s one of those cryptic clues that seems to paint a complete, albeit slightly strange, picture. The kind of crossword clue that makes you pause, read it again, and smile at the setter’s craft.
Here it is:
Not even the head displays peculiarity (7)
At first glance, it’s an odd little sentence. You might imagine a statue or a person remaining stoic, showing no sign of strangeness. But as we know, the surface reading of a cryptic crossword clue is often a beautifully constructed misdirection. Our job is to look past the image it creates and see the machinery whirring underneath.
The first step with any cryptic is to hunt for the definition. This is the part of the clue that gives a straight-up synonym for the answer. More often than not, you’ll find it hiding in plain sight at the very beginning or the very end of the clue. Let’s examine our options. Could the definition be “Not even”? Unlikely. “The head”? Possibly, but it feels more like a component. What about the final word, “peculiarity”? That feels like a solid candidate. We are very likely looking for a seven-letter word that means “peculiarity.”
With the definition tentatively identified, the rest of the clue must be wordplay. This is where the magic happens. We need to assemble a seven-letter word from the phrase “Not even the head displays.” The word “displays” often acts as a connector, a little bridge between the wordplay and the definition, essentially meaning “this part of the clue gives you this answer.”
So, let’s focus on the raw materials: “Not even the head.”
In the wonderfully weird language of cryptic crosswords, common phrases are often codes for other words. Let’s start with “Not even.” If a number isn’t even, what is it? Think of a simple, three-letter word that fits this description. This is a classic piece of crossword vocabulary that every solver should have in their toolkit.
Now for the trickier part: “the head.” What could this possibly mean? It could be an instruction to take the first letter of a word, but there isn’t an obvious word to decapitate. It might be a synonym for a person’s head, like PATE or NAPE. But let’s think more laterally. Are there other kinds of “heads”? Think geographically. What do you call a piece of land that juts out into the sea? There are several terms for such a formation, and one of them is a tidy four-letter word.
Now, let’s put our pieces together. We have a three-letter word from “Not even” and a four-letter word from a specific type of “head.” If you place one after the other, do you get a seven-letter word? And, most importantly, does that resulting word mean “peculiarity”?
This is the beauty of a well-crafted crossword clue. Each part has a purpose, a hidden logic that, once uncovered, fits together perfectly. It’s a small puzzle within a puzzle, and the “Aha!” moment when it all clicks into place is what keeps us coming back for more. Happy solving
Available Answers:
ODDNESS.
Last seen on the crossword puzzle: Metro Cryptic Crossword Clues Thursday, 20 November 2025