| SPLIT | Small city on the Adriatic (pop about 160,000), founded as a Greek colony in the 3rd or 2nd century (5) |
| RIMINI | Italian resort on the Adriatic (pop about 150,0000 (6) |
| ELEA | In ancient Italy, a Greek colony on the Tyrrhenian coast of Lucana (4) |
| LEGAS | You alone may read (3rd) or you pick, aliquem, as a deputy (1st) |
| MARIONETTE | Stringed instrument trio meant to play Beethoven's 2nd, 3rd or 8th |
| BETHLEHEM | Small city on the West Bank (pop about 30,000), close to Jerusalem (9) |
| STASAPH | A very small city on the River Elwy (2,5) |
| LISBURN | Small city on the border between Antrim and Down (7) |
| PHARAOH | The first true one is thought to have been Menes (or Narmer) who ruled around the third or fourth millennium BC (7) |
| III | The third ... or a hint to the rhyming ends of every Across answer |
| HARLEM | Provincial capital in the Netherlands (pop about 160,000), granted city status in 1245 (6) |
| PATERSON | City in New Jersey (pop about 160,000), established in 1791 (8) |
| CUMAE | The oldest Greek colony in Italy, founded about 750 BC near Naples |
| BRINDISI | A drinking song in an act of toasting that shares its name with a port city on the Adriatic (8) |
| YALTA | Resort on the Black Sea (pop 75,000), located on the site of an ancient Greek colony (5) |
| DONEGAL | Irish county (1,865 sq miles; pop about 160,000), the birthplace of Enya (7) |
| ROOKS | Sociable birds renowned for intelligence; around 80,000 of which are thriving in a colony in the Buckenham Marshes in Norfolk (5) |
| ROANOKE | The first attempt to establish an English colony in the New World was on this island in North Carolina |
| OLLIE | Bowler who took 9-78 for Sussex against Glamorgan in Cardiff in the 2021 County Championship and 5-49 for England against South Africa in the 3rd Test at The Oval in 2022 (5) |
| ROBINSON | Bowler who took 9-78 for Sussex against Glamorgan in Cardiff in the 2021 County Championship and 5-49 for England against South Africa in the 3rd Test at The Oval in 2022 (8) |
