Late in 1928, the Guardian made plans to give its readers a weekly cryptic puzzle.

At the time, crosswords were considered a waste of time; other newspapers campaigned against them as a distraction keeping the working man from his duties, but the cryptic was different.

Sly and witty rather than purely definitional, the cryptic makes every clue a little riddle in itself, leaving the solver to puzzle out what the coded message is trying to convey.

The weekly puzzle soon became daily, and today we publish cryptic crossword number 30,000.

The setter is Arachne and, like her stablemates, she is regarded by solvers with an affection usually reserved for favourite authors or close friends.

Here at the Guardian, our setters have names (or at least pseudonyms) and many........

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