English

Alternative forms

• Riphæan
• Riphean
• Riphœan
• Riphoean

Adjective

Riphaean ‎(not comparable)

1. (now historical) Designating a range of mountains once thought to be located in northern Europe, later considered mythological or identified with the Urals. [from 16th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.8:

     The substance, whereof she the body made, / Was purest snow in massy mould congeald, / Which she had gathered in a shady glade / Of the Riphœan hills […].