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Lots of really clever clues in this one, especially 25ac and 7dn! The unclued entry is the key to what's going on. For those answers that seem too long, just note that they all cross that central vertical. That's as much of a helping hand as I'm going to offer.

What I can't fathom is how the 'pairs of letters ... provide' examples. I've written out all the possibilities but all I have is gobbledygook.

In 12a "flag" is the definition, the state is American and "on" is part of the solution. 36a is the one that is "given in the etymology" is the name of an American naval officer and means "extremely". Otherwise I am sitting here baffled with still about half the clues to solve.

Doh!!! Thanks for the hint ionacarr.

Really struggling here too.

Can someone give me a hint for 12A or 9D?

Thanks.

In 12ac the definition is 'tea'. In 9dn you're looking for an 'ancient knew' which could be modified to give another word, though that's not the answer.

I think the answer 'given only in etymologies' is 6dn. Has anyone got far enough to say what's going on with the 'letter pairs'?

Ah, right, I hadn't 6dn as I know Latin and had assumed it was in Chambers by itself. Mea maxima culpa!

Jut spotted something v promising in the letter pairs for the down clues. They don't read in sequence so it's not as simple as I'd assumed.

However, despite knowing the theme I can't get anything from the across pairs at all.

simonsays, 20A is a disused word for a plant "term for spinach = H. The answer is longer than the entry.
36A = Proper name of a US naval officer, that means extremely and jolly as in 'it's jolly good'.

I can't help with 25d and 29d as I'm stuck on those too.

I'm now finding this very tedious. There are so many variables as it's difficult to determine which the replaced letter is in some cases, plus letters that replace themselves, resulting in greater ambiguity.19d appears to be one such, so the letter could be any one of six. A second could be 30A or 31D, but which?

On top of that, the pairs of letters taken in clue order don't seem to yield anything sensible.

Finally the light has dawned and I now have only to match up the substitutions. Approximate coincidences aren't good enough, which is why the letter pairs took me so long to sort out. With a bit of Googling, for which the word 'exact' might be, let's say, handy, I hope others will be able to complete the puzzle without leaving it until the eleventh hour.

For 25ac you need to think very laterally: 'Hope ...' is at the start for the clue for a reason, and paper knives have nothing to do with the solution. For 29dn, the last one I solved, look up 'log' in Chambers.

If it doesn't give too much away, am I right in guessing that 27 down has a connection with the theme?