Word.ws English Dictionary

gryfon

gryfon is the obsolete form of griffin.

Meaning of griffin

Noun

griffin (plural griffins)

  1. A mythical creature with the body of a lion and head and wings of an eagle.
  2. A griffon vulture, a large vulture (Gyps fulvus) found in the mountainous parts of Southern Europe, North Africa, and Asia Minor, supposed to be the "eagle" of the Bible.
  3. An English variety of apple.
  4. (India, dated) A person who has just arrived from Europe.
    • Tables were laid out in the palace, profusely covered with wines and refreshments, in the European style; old hands and griffins, fair sex and civilians, seemed all determined to enjoy themselves[…]1842, The Asiatic journal and monthly register, volume 38, page 40
  5. A cadet newly arrived in British India: half English, half Indian.
  6. A watchful guardian, especially a duenna in charge of a young woman.

See all 19 meanings of griffin

Forms of gryfon

pluralgryfons

Questions about gryfon

What is gryfon the obsolete form of?
Gryfon is the obsolete form of griffin.

Words near gryfon in the dictionary

  1. Gryffindor
  2. Gryffindorish
  3. Gryffindors
  4. Gryfice
  5. Gryfino
  6. gryfon
  7. gryfons
  8. Grygla
  9. gryke
  10. grykes
  11. gryllacridid

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: gryfon (page history and authors); griffin (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “gryfon.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/gryfon. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.