Grampus

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A killer whale (Orcinus orca).

    "Some time after this we saw some very large fish, which I afterwards found were called grampusses."

  2. 2
    slaty-grey blunt-nosed dolphin common in northern seas wordnet
  3. 3
    Risso's dolphin (Grampus griseus), with a blunt nose.
  4. 4
    predatory black-and-white toothed whale with large dorsal fin; common in cold seas wordnet
  5. 5
    A hellbender salamander, Cryptobranchus alleganiensis.
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  1. 6
    A giant whip scorpion (Mastigoproctus giganteus)

Synonyms

All synonyms
grampus griseushellbenderhellbenderkillerkiller whalekiller whale

Example

More examples

"Some time after this we saw some very large fish, which I afterwards found were called grampusses."

Etymology

From Middle English *grampas, grappays, grapas, graspeys, from Anglo-Norman grampais, Old French graspois, craspois (“whale, (salted) whale meat; blubber; seal”), from Medieval Latin craspicis (literally “fat fish”), from Latin crassus (“fat”) + piscis (“fish”).

Related phrases

blow the grampuskiller whaleorcinus orca

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.