The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 6 plus 2 plus 5 letter word PIECES OF EIGHT
I've seen this crossword clue in Independent
P
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E
C
E
S
O
F
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G
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T
More clues leading to the result PIECES OF EIGHT
- Epic thief goes wild for old coins
- In old money, 2 and 6 perhaps
- One, two, and five silver coins?
- Cash once generated from an octet's compositions?
- I see cop baffled before robber returns carrying scrap of gold and silver
- Treasured bits in octets?
- Old coins, forged English copies, purser finally removed from cargo
- Coins once found by men on board belonging to crew
- The GI, say, and the silver
- Men put energy into old contest for real money
Buddy explains!
The straight part
We know that "silver" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case silver = pieces of eight.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.