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[463] πρυμνότατον goes with “ὦμον”, as in l. 504: ‘the shoulder at its very base,’ which is then explained by “κατὰ νῶτον”, = ‘where it joins the back.’ Ameis and others take πρυμνότατον with νῶτον, and explain it of the upper part of the back. It is difficult to say what “πρυμνὸν νῶτον” would mean. The word is regularly used of the hindmost or undermost part of a thing (the base, root, &c.), and in the case of a limb denotes the end next the body. Here the point is that the blow was from behind, and also that it struck Ulysses full in the back—not so as to glance off.

Homer's Odyssey. W. Walter Merry. James Riddell. D. B. Monro. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1886-1901.

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