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There is a strong evolutionary pressure for prey animals to avoid predators through camouflage, and for predators to be able to detect camouflaged prey. There can be a self-perpetuating coevolution, in the shape of an evolutionary arms race, between the perceptive abilities of animals attempting to detect the cryptic animal and the cryptic characteristics of the hiding species.
Cryptic may refer to: In science: Cryptic species complex, a group of species that are very difficult to distinguish from one another; Crypsis, the ability of animals to blend in to avoid observation; Cryptic era, earliest period of the Earth; In music: Cryptic, by Edge of Sanity; Cryptic, a Minnesota-based music group formed by Brownmark
Cryptic crosswords often use abbreviations to clue individual letters or short fragments of the overall solution. These include: Any conventional abbreviations found in a standard dictionary, such as: "current": AC (for "alternating current"); less commonly, DC (for "direct current"); or even I (the symbol used in physics and electronics)
A 15x15 lattice-style grid is common for cryptic crosswords. A cryptic crossword is a crossword puzzle in which each clue is a word puzzle. Cryptic crosswords are particularly popular in the United Kingdom, where they originated, [1] as well as Ireland, the Netherlands, and in several Commonwealth nations, including Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malta, New Zealand, and South Africa.
Terms that are sometimes used synonymously but have more precise meanings are cryptic species for two or more species hidden under one species name, sibling species for two (or more) species that are each other's closest relative, and species flock for a group of closely related species that live in the same habitat.
Cryptic crossword clues need to be viewed two ways. One is a surface reading and one a hidden meaning. [28] The surface reading is the basic reading of the clue to look for key words and how those words are constructed in the clue. The second way is the hidden meaning. This can be a double definition, an anagram, homophone, or words backwards.
Like a standard cryptic crossword clue, the surface reading of a Printer's Devilry clue has nothing to do with the answer. However, a cryptic crossword clue according to Ximenean rules comprises wordplay and a definition. Neither of these are present in a Printer's Devilry. For example, in the following clue:
An antonym is one of a pair of words with opposite meanings. Each word in the pair is the antithesis of the other. A word may have more than one antonym. There are three categories of antonyms identified by the nature of the relationship between the opposed meanings.