ῥάμφος

Next to this word, there are ῥέμφος (rhémphos, “mouth or nose”) and ῥαμψός (rhampsós). The words ῥέμβομαι (rhémbomai, “to turn round, roam”) and ῥόμβος (rhómbos, “wheel”) are phonetically comparable and semantically similar; confront further ῥάβδος (rhábdos, “rod, wand”) and ῥομφαία (rhomphaía, “Thracian sword”). Germanic words have been compared, like Middle Low German wrimpen (“to turn up one's nose”), but these comparisons are ungrounded. The variation β/ψ rather points to a Pre-Greek origin, as does the α-vocalism. Moreover, ῥαιβός (rhaibós, “crooked”) is probably a variant, showing prenasalization.

ῥᾰ́μφος • (rhámphos) n (genitive ῥᾰ́μφεος); third declension

1. crooked beak of birds of prey, bill

   Synonym: ῥύγχος (rhúnkhos)

• Greek: ράμφος (rámfos)

• “ῥάμφος”, in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “ῥάμφος”, in Liddell & Scott (1889) An Intermediate Greek–English Lexicon, New York: Harper & Brothers
• ῥάμφος in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
• Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010) Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 10), with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN