Crossword Genius

Cleaner brought over the French bronze — a fake (9)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

charlatan

'a fake' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'cleaner brought over the french bronze' is the wordplay.
'cleaner' becomes 'char' (charwoman is a type of cleaner).
'brought over' says to put letters next to each other (in a down clue, some letters go above others).
'the french' becomes 'la'.
'bronze' becomes 'tan' (synonyms).
'char'+'la'+'tan'='CHARLATAN'

(Other definitions for charlatan that I've seen before include "Quack doctor" , "Impostor, deceiver" , "Impostor, quack" , "Pretender" , "Quack, fraud, a flamboyant deceiver" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.
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