A measure of power taken up under old Canadian government? (6)
I believe the answer is:
ottawa
'canadian government?' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are singular nouns, I cannot see how they can define each other.
'a measure of power taken up under old' is the wordplay.
'measure of power' becomes 'watt' (unit of power).
'taken up' says the letters should be written backwards.
'under' means one lot of letters go next to another (in a down clue, some letters go below others).
'old' becomes 'o' (common abbreviation eg in OE for Old English).
'a'+'watt'='awatt'
'awatt' in reverse letter order is 'ttawa'.
'ttawa' after 'o' is 'OTTAWA'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for ottawa that I've seen before include "The capital of Canada (6)" , "Foreign capital" , "capital city" , "N. American city" , "North American city" .)