Definition of the word death

«Deceased» redirects here. For the band, see Deceased (band).

Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism.^[1] For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including the brainstem, and^[2][3] brain death is sometimes used as a legal definition of death.^[4] The remains of a former organism normally begin to decompose shortly after death.^[5] Death is an inevitable process that eventually occurs in all organisms. Some organisms, such as Turritopsis dohrnii, are biologically immortal. However, they can still die from other means than aging.^[6]

Figuring out when someone is dead has been a problem. Initially, there was the definition of death when breathing and the heartbeat ceased.^[7] However, the spread of CPR no longer meant it was irreversible.^[8] Brain death was the next option, which fractured between different definitions. Some people believe that all brain functions must cease. Some believe that even if the brainstem is still alive, their personality and identity are dead, so therefore, they should be entirely dead.^[9]

Death is generally applied to whole organisms; the similar process seen in individual components of an organism, such as cells or tissues, is necrosis.^[10] Something that is not considered an organism, such as a virus, can be physically destroyed but is not said to die, as a virus is not considered alive.^[11] As of the early 21st century, 56 million people die per year. The most common reason is cardiovascular disease, which is a disease that affects the heart.^[12]

Many cultures and religions have the idea of an afterlife and also may hold the idea of judgment of good and bad deeds in one’s life. There may also be different customs for honoring the body, such as a funeral, cremation, or sky burial.^[13]

Death is actively trying to be cured by a group of scientists known as biogerontologists, through seeking to do the same as biologically immortal organisms do and applying a similar means to humans.^[14] However, as humans do not have the means to apply this to themselves, they have to use other ways to reach the maximum lifespan for a human, such as calorie reduction, dieting, and exercise.^[15]

Diagnosis

Problems of definition

The concept of death is a key to human understanding of the phenomenon.^[16] There are many scientific approaches and various interpretations of the concept. Additionally, the advent of life-sustaining therapy and the numerous criteria for defining death from both a medical and legal standpoint have made it difficult to create a single unifying definition.^[17]

Defining life to define death

One of the challenges in defining death is in distinguishing it from life. As a point in time, death seems to refer to the moment when life ends. Determining when death has occurred is difficult, as cessation of life functions is often not simultaneous across organ systems.^[18] Such determination, therefore, requires drawing precise conceptual boundaries between life and death. This is difficult due to there being little consensus on how to define life.

It is possible to define life in terms of consciousness. When consciousness ceases, an organism can be said to have died. One of the flaws in this approach is that there are many organisms that are alive but probably not conscious.^[19] Another problem is in defining consciousness, which has many different definitions given by modern scientists, psychologists and philosophers.^[20] Additionally, many religious traditions, including Abrahamic and Dharmic traditions, hold that death does not (or may not) entail the end of consciousness. In certain cultures, death is more of a process than a single event. It implies a slow shift from one spiritual state to another.^[21]

Other definitions for death focus on the character of cessation of organismic functioning and human death, which refers to irreversible loss of personhood. More specifically, death occurs when a living entity experiences irreversible cessation of all functioning.^[22] As it pertains to human life, death is an irreversible process where someone loses their existence as a person.^[22]

Definition of death by heartbeat and breath

Historically, attempts to define the exact moment of a human’s death have been subjective or imprecise. Death was defined as the cessation of heartbeat (cardiac arrest) and breathing,^[7] but the development of CPR and prompt defibrillation have rendered that definition inadequate because breathing and heartbeat can sometimes be restarted.^[8] This type of death where circulatory and respiratory arrest happens is known as the circulatory definition of death (CDD). Proponents of the CDD believe this definition is reasonable because a person with permanent loss of circulatory and respiratory function should be considered dead.^[23] Critics of this definition state that while cessation of these functions may be permanent, it does not mean the situation is irreversible because if CPR was applied fast enough, the person could be revived.^[23] Thus, the arguments for and against the CDD boil down to defining the actual words «permanent» and «irreversible,» which further complicates the challenge of defining death. Furthermore, events causally linked to death in the past no longer kill in all circumstances; without a functioning heart or lungs, life can sometimes be sustained with a combination of life support devices, organ transplants, and artificial pacemakers.

Brain death

Today, where a definition of the moment of death is required, doctors and coroners usually turn to «brain death» or «biological death» to define a person as being dead;^[24] people are considered dead when the electrical activity in their brain ceases.^[25] It is presumed that an end of electrical activity indicates the end of consciousness.^[26] Suspension of consciousness must be permanent and not transient, as occurs during certain sleep stages, and especially a coma.^[27] In the case of sleep, EEGs are used to tell the difference.^[28]

The category of «brain death» is seen as problematic by some scholars. For instance, Dr. Franklin Miller, a senior faculty member at the Department of Bioethics, National Institutes of Health, notes: «By the late 1990s… the equation of brain death with death of the human being was increasingly challenged by scholars, based on evidence regarding the array of biological functioning displayed by patients correctly diagnosed as having this condition who were maintained on mechanical ventilation for substantial periods of time. These patients maintained the ability to sustain circulation and respiration, control temperature, excrete wastes, heal wounds, fight infections and, most dramatically, to gestate fetuses (in the case of pregnant «brain-dead» women).»^[29]

While «brain death» is viewed as problematic by some scholars, there are certainly proponents of it that believe this definition of death is the most reasonable for distinguishing life from death. The reasoning behind the support for this definition is that brain death has a set of criteria that is reliable and reproducible. Also, the brain is crucial in determining our identity or who we are as human beings. The distinction should be made that «brain death» cannot be equated with one in a vegetative state or coma, in that the former situation describes a state that is beyond recovery.^[30]

EEGs can detect spurious electrical impulses, while certain drugs, hypoglycemia, hypoxia, or hypothermia can suppress or even stop brain activity temporarily;^[31] because of this, hospitals have protocols for determining brain death involving EEGs at widely separated intervals under defined conditions.^[32]

Neocortical brain death

People maintaining that only the neo-cortex of the brain is necessary for consciousness sometimes argue that only electrical activity should be considered when defining death. Eventually, the criterion for death may be the permanent and irreversible loss of cognitive function, as evidenced by the death of the cerebral cortex. All hope of recovering human thought and personality is then gone, given current and foreseeable medical technology.^[9] Even by whole-brain criteria, the determination of brain death can be complicated.

Total brain death

At present, in most places, the more conservative definition of death – irreversible cessation of electrical activity in the whole brain, as opposed to just in the neo-cortex – has been adopted. For example, the Uniform Determination Of Death Act in the United States.^[33] In the past, the adoption of this whole-brain definition was a conclusion of the President’s Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research in 1980.^[34] They concluded that this approach to defining death sufficed in reaching a uniform definition nationwide. A multitude of reasons was presented to support this definition, including uniformity of standards in law for establishing death, consumption of a family’s fiscal resources for artificial life support, and legal establishment for equating brain death with death to proceed with organ donation.^[35]

Problems in medical practice

Aside from the issue of support of or dispute against brain death, there is another inherent problem in this categorical definition: the variability of its application in medical practice. In 1995, the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) established the criteria that became the medical standard for diagnosing neurologic death. At that time, three clinical features had to be satisfied to determine «irreversible cessation» of the total brain, including coma with clear etiology, cessation of breathing, and lack of brainstem reflexes.^[36] This criteria was updated again, most recently in 2010, but substantial discrepancies remain across hospitals and medical specialties.^[36]

Donations

The problem of defining death is especially imperative as it pertains to the dead donor rule, which could be understood as one of the following interpretations of the rule: there must be an official declaration of death in a person before starting organ procurement, or that organ procurement cannot result in the death of the donor.^[23] A great deal of controversy has surrounded the definition of death and the dead donor rule. Advocates of the rule believe that the rule is legitimate in protecting organ donors while also countering any moral or legal objection to organ procurement. Critics, on the other hand, believe that the rule does not uphold the best interests of the donors and that the rule does not effectively promote organ donation.^[23]

Signs

Signs of death or strong indications that a warm-blooded animal is no longer alive are:^[37]

• Respiratory arrest (no breathing)
• Cardiac arrest (no pulse)
• Brain death (no neuronal activity)

The stages that follow after death are:^[38]

• Pallor mortis, paleness which happens in 15–120 minutes after death
• Algor mortis, the reduction in body temperature following death. This is generally a steady decline until matching ambient temperature
• Rigor mortis, the limbs of the corpse become stiff (Latin rigor) and difficult to move or manipulate
• Livor mortis, a settling of the blood in the lower (dependent) portion of the body
• Putrefaction, the beginning signs of decomposition
• Decomposition, the reduction into simpler forms of matter, accompanied by a strong, unpleasant odor.
• Skeletonization, the end of decomposition, where all soft tissues have decomposed, leaving only the skeleton.
• Fossilization, the natural preservation of the skeletal remains formed over a very long period

Legal

The death of a person has legal consequences that may vary between jurisdictions. Most countries follow the whole-brain death criteria, where all functions of the brain must have completely ceased. However, in other jurisdictions, some follow the brainstem version of brain death.^[36] Afterward, a death certificate is issued in most jurisdictions, either by a doctor or by an administrative office, upon presentation of a doctor’s declaration of death.^[39]

Misdiagnosis

There are many anecdotal references to people being declared dead by physicians and then «coming back to life,» sometimes days later in their coffin or when embalming procedures are about to begin. From the mid-18th century onwards, there was an upsurge in the public’s fear of being mistakenly buried alive^[40] and much debate about the uncertainty of the signs of death. Various suggestions were made to test for signs of life before burial, ranging from pouring vinegar and pepper into the corpse’s mouth to applying red hot pokers to the feet or into the rectum.^[41] Writing in 1895, the physician J.C. Ouseley claimed that as many as 2,700 people were buried prematurely each year in England and Wales, although some estimates peg the figure to be closer to 800.^[42]

In cases of electric shock, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for an hour or longer can allow stunned nerves to recover, allowing an apparently dead person to survive. People found unconscious under icy water may survive if their faces are kept continuously cold until they arrive at an emergency room.^[43] This «diving response,» in which metabolic activity and oxygen requirements are minimal, is something humans share with cetaceans called the mammalian diving reflex.^[43]

As medical technologies advance, ideas about when death occurs may have to be reevaluated in light of the ability to restore a person to vitality after longer periods of apparent death (as happened when CPR and defibrillation showed that cessation of heartbeat is inadequate as a decisive indicator of death). The lack of electrical brain activity may not be enough to consider someone scientifically dead. Therefore, the concept of information-theoretic death has been suggested as a better means of defining when true death occurs, though the concept has few practical applications outside the field of cryonics.^[44]

Causes

The leading cause of human death in developing countries is infectious disease. The leading causes in developed countries are atherosclerosis (heart disease and stroke), cancer, and other diseases related to obesity and aging. By an extremely wide margin, the largest unifying cause of death in the developed world is biological aging,^[45] leading to various complications known as aging-associated diseases. These conditions cause loss of homeostasis, leading to cardiac arrest, causing loss of oxygen and nutrient supply, causing irreversible deterioration of the brain and other tissues. Of the roughly 150,000 people who die each day across the globe, about two thirds die of age-related causes.^[45] In industrialized nations, the proportion is much higher, approaching 90%.^[45] With improved medical capability, dying has become a condition to be managed.

In developing nations, inferior sanitary conditions and lack of access to modern medical technology make death from infectious diseases more common than in developed countries. One such disease is tuberculosis, a bacterial disease that killed 1.8 million people in 2015.^[47] Malaria causes about 400–900 million cases of fever and 1–3M deaths annually.^[48] The AIDS death toll in Africa may reach 90–100 million by 2025.^[49][50]

According to Jean Ziegler, the United Nations Special Reporter on the Right to Food, 2000 – Mar 2008, mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality rate in 2006. Ziegler says worldwide, approximately 62 million people died from all causes and of those deaths, more than 36 million died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients.^[51]

Tobacco smoking killed 100 million people worldwide in the 20th century and could kill 1 billion people worldwide in the 21st century, a World Health Organization report warned.^[46]

Many leading developed world causes of death can be postponed by diet and physical activity, but the accelerating incidence of disease with age still imposes limits on human longevity. The evolutionary cause of aging is, at best, only beginning to be understood. It has been suggested that direct intervention in the aging process may now be the most effective intervention against major causes of death.^[52]

Selye proposed a unified non-specific approach to many causes of death. He demonstrated that stress decreases the adaptability of an organism and proposed to describe adaptability as a special resource, adaptation energy. The animal dies when this resource is exhausted.^[53] Selye assumed that adaptability is a finite supply presented at birth. Later, Goldstone proposed the concept of production or income of adaptation energy which may be stored (up to a limit) as a capital reserve of adaptation.^[54] In recent works, adaptation energy is considered an internal coordinate on the «dominant path» in the model of adaptation. It is demonstrated that oscillations of well-being appear when the reserve of adaptability is almost exhausted.^[55]

In 2012, suicide overtook car crashes as the leading cause of human injury deaths in the U.S., followed by poisoning, falls, and murder.^[56] The causes of death are different in different parts of the world. In high-income and middle-income countries, nearly half up to more than two-thirds of all people live beyond the age of 70 and predominantly die of chronic diseases. In low-income countries, where less than one in five of all people reach the age of 70, and more than a third of all deaths are among children under 15, people predominantly die of infectious diseases.^[57]

In animals, predation can be a common cause of death, livestock have a 6% death rate from predation. However, if you are younger, 50% of young foxes die to birds, bobcats, coyotes, and other foxes as well. Young bear cubs in the Yellowstone National Park only have a 40% chance to survive to adulthood from other bears and predators.^[58]

Natural disasters kill around 45,000 people annually, although this number can vary to millions to thousands on a per decade basis. Some of the deadliest natural disasters are the 1931 China Floods, which killed and estimated 4 million people, although, estimates widely vary,^[59] the 1887 Yellow River Flood, which killed an estimated 2 million people in China,^[60] and the 1970 Bhola Cyclone, killing 500,000 people in Pakistan.^[61]

Accidents and disasters have many different types, from nuclear disasters and structural collapses. One of the deadliest incidents of all time is the Failure of the 1975 Banqiao Dam Failure, with varying estimates, up to 240,000 dead.^[62] Other incidents with high death tolls are; the Wanggongchang explosion when a gunpowder factory ended up with 20,000 deaths,^[63] a collapse of a wall of Circus Maximus killing 13,000 people,^[64] and the Chernobyl disaster killing between 95 to 4,000 people killed.^[65][66]

Autopsy

An autopsy, also known as a postmortem examination or an obduction, is a medical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a human corpse to determine the cause and manner of a person’s death and to evaluate any disease or injury that may be present. It is usually performed by a specialized medical doctor called a pathologist.^[67]

Autopsies are either performed for legal or medical purposes.^[67] A forensic autopsy is carried out when the cause of death may be a criminal matter, while a clinical or academic autopsy is performed to find the medical cause of death and is used in cases of unknown or uncertain death, or for research purposes.^[68] Autopsies can be further classified into cases where external examination suffices, and those where the body is dissected and an internal examination is conducted.^[69] Permission from next of kin may be required for internal autopsy in some cases.^[70] Once an internal autopsy is complete the body is generally reconstituted by sewing it back together.^[38]

A necropsy, which is not always a medical procedure, was a term previously used to describe an unregulated postmortem examination. In modern times, this term is more commonly associated with the corpses of animals.^[71]

Death before birth

Death before birth can happen in several ways: stillbirth, when the fetus dies before or during the delivery process; miscarriage, when the embryo dies before independent survival; and abortion, the artificial termination of the pregnancy. Stillbirth and miscarriage can happen for various reasons, while abortion is carried out purposely.

Stillbirth

Stillbirth can happen right before or after the delivery of a fetus. It can result from defects of the fetus or risk factors present in the mother. Reductions of these factors, caesarean sections when risks are present, and early detection of birth defects have lowered the rate of stillbirth. However, 1% of births in the United States end in a stillbirth.^[72]

Miscarriage

A miscarriage is defined by the World Health Organization as, «The expulsion or extraction from its mother of an embryo or fetus weighing 500g or less.» Miscarriage is one of the most frequent problems in pregnancy, and is reported in around 12–15% of all clinical pregnancies; however, by including pregnancy losses during menstruation, it could be up to 17–22% of all pregnancies. There are many risk-factors involved in miscarriage; consumption of caffeine, tobacco, alcohol, drugs, having a previous miscarriage, and the use of abortion can increase the chances of having a miscarriage.^[73]

Abortion

An abortion may be performed for many reasons, such as pregnancy from rape, financial constraints of having a child, teenage pregnancy, and the lack of support from a significant other.^[74] There are two forms of abortion: a medical abortion and an in-clinic abortion or sometimes referred to as a surgical abortion. A medical abortion involves taking a pill that will terminate the pregnancy no more than 11 weeks past the last period, and an in-clinic abortion involves a medical procedure using suction to empty the uterus; this is possible after 12 weeks, but it may be more difficult to find an operating doctor who will go through with the procedure.^[75]

Senescence

Senescence refers to a scenario when a living being can survive all calamities but eventually dies due to causes relating to old age. Conversely, premature death can refer to a death that occurs before old age arrives, for example, human death before a person reaches the age of 75.^[76] Animal and plant cells normally reproduce and function during the whole period of natural existence, but the aging process derives from the deterioration of cellular activity and the ruination of regular functioning. The aptitude of cells for gradual deterioration and mortality means that cells are naturally sentenced to stable and long-term loss of living capacities, even despite continuing metabolic reactions and viability. In the United Kingdom, for example, nine out of ten of all the deaths that occur daily relates to senescence, while around the world, it accounts for two-thirds of 150,000 deaths that take place daily.^[77]

Almost all animals who survive external hazards to their biological functioning eventually die from biological aging, known in life sciences as «senescence.» Some organisms experience negligible senescence, even exhibiting biological immortality. These include the jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii,^[78] the hydra, and the planarian. Unnatural causes of death include suicide and predation. Of all causes, roughly 150,000 people die around the world each day.^[45] Of these, two-thirds die directly or indirectly due to senescence, but in industrialized countries – such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany – the rate approaches 90% (i.e., nearly nine out of ten of all deaths are related to senescence).^[45]

Physiological death is now seen as a process, more than an event: conditions once considered indicative of death are now reversible.^[79] Where in the process, a dividing line is drawn between life and death depends on factors beyond the presence or absence of vital signs. In general, clinical death is neither necessary nor sufficient for a determination of legal death. A patient with working heart and lungs determined to be brain dead can be pronounced legally dead without clinical death occurring.^[80]

Life extension

Life extension refers to an increase in maximum or average lifespan, especially in humans, by slowing down or reversing the processes of aging through anti-aging measures. Although aging is the most common cause of death worldwide, it is socially mostly ignored as such and seen as «necessary» and «inevitable» anyway, which is why little money is spent on research into anti-aging therapies, a phenomenon known as the pro-aging trance.^[45]

The average lifespan is determined by vulnerability to accidents and age or lifestyle-related afflictions such as cancer or cardiovascular disease. Extension of average lifespan can be achieved by good diet, exercise, and avoidance of hazards such as smoking. Maximum lifespan is also determined by the rate of aging for a species inherent in its genes. Currently, the only widely recognized method of extending the maximum lifespan is calorie restriction.^[15] Theoretically, the extension of the maximum lifespan can be achieved by reducing the rate of aging damage, by periodic replacement of damaged tissues, or by molecular repair or rejuvenation of deteriorated cells and tissues.^[81]

A United States poll found that religious people and irreligious people, as well as men and women and people of different economic classes, have similar rates of support for life extension, while Africans and Hispanics have higher rates of support than white people. Thirty-Eight percent of the polled said they would desire to have their aging process cured.^[82]

Researchers of life extension are a subclass of biogerontologists known as «biomedical gerontologists.» They try to understand the nature of aging, and they develop treatments to reverse aging processes or at least slow them down for the improvement of health and the maintenance of youthful vigor at every stage of life.^[14] Those who take advantage of life extension findings and seek to apply them to themselves are called «life extensionists» or «longevists.» The primary life extension strategy currently is to apply available anti-aging methods in the hope of living long enough to benefit from a complete cure for aging once it is developed.^[83]

Cryonics

Cryonics (from Greek κρύος ‘kryos-‘ meaning ‘icy cold’) is the low-temperature preservation of animals and humans who cannot be sustained by contemporary medicine, with the hope that healing and resuscitation may be possible in the future.^[84][85]

Cryopreservation of people or large animals is not reversible with current technology. The stated rationale for cryonics is that people who are considered dead by current legal or medical definitions may not necessarily be dead according to the more stringent information-theoretic definition of death.^[44][86]

Some scientific literature is claimed to support the feasibility of cryonics.^[87] Medical science and cryobiologists generally regard cryonics with skepticism.^[88]

Location

Around 1930, most people in Western countries died in their own homes, surrounded by family, and comforted by clergy, neighbors, and doctors making house calls.^[91] By the mid-20th century, half of all Americans died in a hospital.^[92] By the start of the 21st century, only about 20 to 25% of people in developed countries died outside of a medical institution.^[92][93][94] The shift from dying at home towards dying in a professional medical environment has been termed the «Invisible Death.»^[92] This shift occurred gradually over the years until most deaths now occur outside the home.^[95]

Psychology

Death studies is a field within psychology.^[96] Many people have a fear of dying. Discussing, thinking about, or planning for their deaths causes them discomfort. This fear may cause them to put off financial planning, preparing a will and testament, or requesting help from a hospice organization.

Mortality salience is the awareness that death is inevitable. However, self-esteem and culture are ways to reduce the anxiety this effect can cause.^[97] The awareness of someone’s own death can cause a deepened bond in their in-group as a defense mechanism. This can also cause the person to become very judging. In a study, two groups were formed; one group was asked to reflect upon their mortality, the other was not, afterwards, the groups were told to set a bond for a prostitute. The group that did not reflect on death had an average of $50, the group who was reminded about their death had an average of $455 dollars.^[98]

Different people have different responses to the idea of their deaths. Philosopher Galen Strawson writes that the death that many people wish for is an instant, painless, unexperienced annihilation.^[99] In this unlikely scenario, the person dies without realizing it and without being able to fear it. One moment the person is walking, eating, or sleeping, and the next moment, the person is dead. Strawson reasons that this type of death would not take anything away from the person, as he believes a person cannot have a legitimate claim to ownership in the future.^[99][100]

Society and culture

In society, the nature of death and humanity’s awareness of its mortality has, for millennia, been a concern of the world’s religious traditions and philosophical inquiry. Including belief in resurrection or an afterlife (associated with Abrahamic religions), reincarnation or rebirth (associated with Dharmic religions), or that consciousness permanently ceases to exist, known as eternal oblivion (associated with Secular humanism).^[101]

Commemoration ceremonies after death may include various mourning, funeral practices, and ceremonies of honoring the deceased.^[102] The physical remains of a person, commonly known as a corpse or body, are usually interred whole or cremated, though among the world’s cultures, there are a variety of other methods of mortuary disposal.^[13] In the English language, blessings directed towards a dead person include rest in peace (originally the Latin, requiescat in pace) or its initialism RIP.

Death is the center of many traditions and organizations; customs relating to death are a feature of every culture around the world. Much of this revolves around the care of the dead, as well as the afterlife and the disposal of bodies upon the onset of death. The disposal of human corpses does, in general, begin with the last offices before significant time has passed, and ritualistic ceremonies often occur, most commonly interment or cremation. This is not a unified practice; in Tibet, for instance, the body is given a sky burial and left on a mountain top. Proper preparation for death and techniques and ceremonies for producing the ability to transfer one’s spiritual attainments into another body (reincarnation) are subjects of detailed study in Tibet.^[103] Mummification or embalming is also prevalent in some cultures to retard the rate of decay.^[104]

Some parts of death in culture are legally based, having laws for when death occurs, such as the receiving of a death certificate, the settlement of the deceased estate, and the issues of inheritance and, in some countries, inheritance taxation.^[105]

Capital punishment is also a culturally divisive aspect of death. In most jurisdictions where capital punishment is carried out today, the death penalty is reserved for premeditated murder, espionage, treason, or as part of military justice. In some countries, sexual crimes, such as adultery and sodomy, carry the death penalty, as do religious crimes, such as apostasy, the formal renunciation of one’s religion. In many retentionist countries, drug trafficking is also a capital offense. In China, human trafficking and serious cases of corruption are also punished by the death penalty. In militaries around the world, courts-martial have imposed death sentences for offenses such as cowardice, desertion, insubordination, and mutiny.^[106]

Death in warfare and suicide attack also have cultural links, and the ideas of dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, which translates to «It is sweet and proper to die for one’s country,» mutiny punishable by death, such as in the United States,^[107] grieving relatives of dead soldiers and death notification are embedded in many cultures.^[108] Recently in the western world, with the increase in terrorism following the September 11 attacks, but also further back in time with suicide bombings, kamikaze missions in World War II, and suicide missions in a host of other conflicts in history, death for a cause by way of suicide attack, and martyrdom have had significant cultural impacts.^[109]

Suicide, in general, and particularly euthanasia, are also points of cultural debate. Both acts are understood very differently in different cultures.^[110] In Japan, for example, ending a life with honor by seppuku was considered a desirable death,^[111] whereas according to traditional Christian and Islamic cultures, suicide is viewed as a sin.

Death is personified in many cultures, with such symbolic representations as the Grim Reaper, Azrael, the Hindu god Yama, and Father Time. In the west, the Grim Reaper, or figures similar to it, is the most popular depiction of death in western cultures.^[113]

In Brazil, death is counted officially when it is registered by existing family members at a cartório, a government-authorized registry. Before being able to file for an official death, the deceased must have been registered for an official birth at the cartório. Though a Public Registry Law guarantees all Brazilian citizens the right to register deaths, regardless of their financial means of their family members (often children), the Brazilian government has not taken away the burden, the hidden costs, and fees of filing for a death. For many impoverished families, the indirect costs and burden of filing for a death lead to a more appealing, unofficial, local, and cultural burial, which, in turn, raises the debate about inaccurate mortality rates.^[114]

Talking about death and witnessing it is a difficult issue in most cultures. Western societies may like to treat the dead with the utmost material respect, with an official embalmer and associated rites.^[104] Eastern societies (like India) may be more open to accepting it as a fait accompli, with a funeral procession of the dead body ending in an open-air burning-to-ashes.^[115]

Origins of death

The origin of death is a theme or myth of how death came to be. It is present in nearly all cultures across the world, as death is a universal happening.^[116] This makes it an origin myth, a myth that describes how a feature of the natural or social world appeared.^[117][118] There can be some similarities between myths and cultures. In North American mythology, the theme of a man who wants to be immortal and a man who wants to die can be seen across many Indigenous people.^[119] In Christianity, death is the result of the fall of man after eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.^[116] In Greek mythology, the opening of Pandora’s box releases death upon the world.^[120]

Consciousness

Much interest and debate surround the question of what happens to one’s consciousness as one’s body dies. The belief in the permanent loss of consciousness after death is often called eternal oblivion. The belief that the stream of consciousness is preserved after physical death is described by the term afterlife. Neither is likely to be confirmed without the ponderer having to die.

Near-death experiences are the closest thing people have to an afterlife that we know. Some people who have had near-death experiences (NDEs) report that they have seen the afterlife while they were dead. Seeing a being of light and talking with it, life flashing before the eyes, and the confirmation of cultural beliefs of the afterlife are all themes that happen during the moments they are dead.^[121]

In biology

After death, the remains of a former organism become part of the biogeochemical cycle, during which animals may be consumed by a predator or a scavenger.^[122] Organic material may then be further decomposed by detritivores, organisms that recycle detritus, returning it to the environment for reuse in the food chain, where these chemicals may eventually end up being consumed and assimilated into the cells of an organism.^[123] Examples of detritivores include earthworms, woodlice, and millipedes.^[124]

Microorganisms also play a vital role, raising the temperature of the decomposing matter as they break it down into yet simpler molecules.^[125] Not all materials need to be fully decomposed. Coal, a fossil fuel formed over vast tracts of time in swamp ecosystems, is one example.^[126]

Natural selection

The contemporary evolutionary theory sees death as an important part of the process of natural selection. It is considered that organisms less adapted to their environment are more likely to die, having produced fewer offspring, thereby reducing their contribution to the gene pool. Their genes are thus eventually bred out of a population, leading at worst to extinction and, more positively, making the process possible, referred to as speciation. Frequency of reproduction plays an equally important role in determining species survival: an organism that dies young but leaves numerous offspring displays, according to Darwinian criteria, much greater fitness than a long-lived organism leaving only one.^[127][128]

Death also has a role in competition, where if a species out-competes another, there is a risk of death for the population. Especially in the case where they are directly fighting over resources.^[129]

Extinction

Death plays a role in extinction, the cessation of existence of a species or group of taxa, reducing biodiversity, due to extinction being generally considered to be the death of the last individual of that species (although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point). Because a species’ potential range may be very large, determining this moment is difficult, and is usually done retrospectively.^[131]

Evolution of aging and mortality

Inquiry into the evolution of aging aims to explain why so many living things and the vast majority of animals weaken and die with age. However, there are exceptions, such as Hydra and the jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii, which research shows to be biologically immortal.^[132]

Organisms showing only asexual reproduction, such as bacteria, some protists, like the euglenoids and many amoebozoans, and unicellular organisms with sexual reproduction, colonial or not, like the volvocine algae Pandorina and Chlamydomonas, are «immortal» at some extent, dying only due to external hazards, like being eaten or meeting with a fatal accident. In multicellular organisms and also in multinucleate ciliates^[133] with a Weismannist development, that is, with a division of labor between mortal somatic (body) cells and «immortal» germ (reproductive) cells, death becomes an essential part of life, at least for the somatic line.^[134]

The Volvox algae are among the simplest organisms to exhibit that division of labor between two completely different cell types, and as a consequence, include the death of somatic line as a regular, genetically regulated part of its life history.^[134][135]

Grief in animals

Animals have sometimes shown grief for their partners or «friends.» When two chimpanzees form a bond together, sexual or not, and one of them dies, the surviving chimpanzee will show signs of grief, ripping out their hair in anger and starting to cry; if the body is removed, they will resist, they will eventually go quiet when the body is gone, but upon seeing the body again, the chimp will return to a violent state.^[136]

Death of abiotic factors

Some non-living things can be considered dead. For example, a volcano, batteries, electrical components, and stars are all nonliving things that can «die,» whether from destruction or cessation of function.

A volcano, a break in the earth’s crust that allows lava, ash, and gases to escape, has three states that it may be in, active, dormant, and extinct. An active volcano has recently or is currently erupting; in a dormant volcano, it has not erupted for a significant amount of time, but it may erupt again; in an extinct volcano, it may be cut off from the supply of its lava and will never expected to erupt again, so the volcano can be considered to be dead.^[137]

A battery can be considered dead after the charge is fully used up. Electrical components are similar in this fashion, in the case that it may not be able to be used again, such as after a spill of water on the components,^[138] the component can be considered dead.

Stars also have a life-span and, therefore, can die. After it starts to run out of fuel, it starts to expand, this can be analogous to the star aging. After it exhausts all fuel, it may explode in a supernova,^[139] collapse into a black hole, or turn into a neutron star.^[140]

Religious views

Buddhism

In Buddhist doctrine and practice, death plays an important role. Awareness of death motivated Prince Siddhartha to strive to find the «deathless» and finally attain enlightenment. In Buddhist doctrine, death functions as a reminder of the value of having been born as a human being. Being reborn as a human being is considered the only state in which one can attain enlightenment. Therefore, death helps remind oneself that one should not take life for granted. The belief in rebirth among Buddhists does not necessarily remove death anxiety since all existence in the cycle of rebirth is considered filled with suffering, and being reborn many times does not necessarily mean that one progresses.^[141]

Death is part of several key Buddhist tenets, such as the Four Noble Truths and dependent origination.^[141]

Christianity

While there are different sects of Christianity with different branches of belief. The overarching ideology on death grows from the knowledge of the afterlife. Meaning after death, the individual will undergo a separation from mortality to immortality; their soul leaves the body entering a realm of spirits. Following this separation of body and spirit (death), resurrection will occur.^[142] Representing the same transformation Jesus Christ embodied after his body was placed in the tomb for three days, each person’s body will be resurrected, reuniting the spirit and body in a perfect form. This process allows the individual’s soul to withstand death and transform into life after death.^[143]

Hinduism

In Hindu texts, death is described as the individual eternal spiritual jiva-atma (soul or conscious self) exiting the current temporary material body. The soul exits this body when the body can no longer sustain the conscious self (life), which may be due to mental or physical reasons or, more accurately, the inability to act on one’s kama (material desires).^[144] During conception, the soul enters a compatible new body based on the remaining merits and demerits of one’s karma (good/bad material activities based on dharma) and the state of one’s mind (impressions or last thoughts) at the time of death.^[145]

Usually, the process of reincarnation makes one forget all memories of one’s previous life. Because nothing really dies and the temporary material body is always changing, both in this life and the next, death means forgetfulness of one’s previous experiences.^[146]

Islam

The Islamic view is that death is the separation of the soul from the body as well as the beginning of the afterlife.^[147] The afterlife, or akhirah, is one of the six main beliefs in Islam. Rather than seeing death as the end of life, Muslims consider death as a continuation of life in another form.^[148] In Islam, life on earth right now is a short, temporary life and a testing period for every soul. True life begins with the Day of Judgement when all people will be divided into two groups. The righteous believers will be welcomed to janna (heaven), and the disbelievers and evildoers will be punished in jahannam (hellfire).^[149]

Muslims believe death to be wholly natural and predetermined by God. Only God knows the exact time of a person’s death.^[150] The Quran emphasizes that death is inevitable, no matter how much people try to escape death, it will reach everyone. (Q50:16) Life on earth is the one and only chance for people to prepare themselves for the life to come and choose to either believe or not believe in God, and death is the end of that learning opportunity.^[151]

Judaism

There are a variety of beliefs about the afterlife within Judaism, but none of them contradict the preference for life over death. This is partially because death puts a cessation to the possibility of fulfilling any commandments.^[152]

Language

The word «death» comes from Old English dēaþ, which in turn comes from Proto-Germanic *dauþuz (reconstructed by etymological analysis). This comes from the Proto-Indo-European stem *dheu- meaning the «process, act, condition of dying.»^[153]

The concept and symptoms of death, and varying degrees of delicacy used in discussion in public forums, have generated numerous scientific, legal, and socially acceptable terms or euphemisms. When a person has died, it is also said they have «passed away», «passed on», «expired», or «gone», among other socially accepted, religiously specific, slang, and irreverent terms.

As a formal reference to a dead person, it has become common practice to use the participle form of «decease», as in «the deceased»; another noun form is «decedent».

Bereft of life, the dead person is a «corpse», «cadaver», «body», «set of remains» or, when all flesh is gone, a «skeleton». The terms «carrion» and «carcass» are also used, usually for dead non-human animals. The ashes left after a cremation are lately called «cremains».

See also

References

Bibliography

Further reading

• Cochem, Martin of (1899). «On Death» . The four last things: death, judgment, hell, heaven. Benziger Brothers.
• Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul. (1856). «Considerations on Death» . St. Vincent’s Manual. John Murphy & Co.
• Liguori, Alphonsus (1868). Preparation for Death . Rivingtons.
• Marques, Susana Moreira (2015). Now and At the Hour of Our Death. Translated by Sanches, Julia. And Other Stories. ISBN 978-1908276629.
• Massillon, Jean-Baptiste (1879). «On Death» . Sermons by John-Baptist Massillon. Thomas Tegg & Sons.
• Rosenberg, David (17 August 2014). «How One Photographer Overcame His Fear of Death by Photographing It (Walter Schels’ Life Before Death)». Slate.
• Sachs, Jessica Snyder (2001). Corpse: Nature, Forensics, and the Struggle to Pinpoint Time of Death (270 pages). Perseus Publishing. ISBN 978-0738203362.
• Warraich, Haider (2017). Modern Death: How Medicine Changed the End of Life. St. Martin’s Press. ISBN 978-1250104588.

External links

• Death at Curlie
• «Death». Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2016.
• «Death» . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 7 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 898–900.
• Best, Ben. «Causes of Death». BenBest.com. Retrieved 10 June 2016.
• Schels, Walter; Lakotta, Beate. «Before and After Death». LensCulture.com. Archived from the original on 11 October 2014. Retrieved 19 September 2016. Interviews with people dying in hospices, and portraits of them before, and shortly after, death.
• U.S. Census. «Causes of Death 1916». AntiqueBooks.net (scanns). Archived from the original on 18 September 2004. Retrieved 19 September 2016. How the medical profession categorized causes of death.
• Wald, George. «The Origin of Death». ElijahWald.com. A biologist explains life and death in different kinds of organisms, in relation to evolution.
• «Death» (video; 10:18) by Timothy Ferris, producer of the Voyager Golden Record for NASA. 2021

Last Updated:
7 Apr 2023
— Updated example sentences

Promoted to Headline (H3) on 8/21/09: On ‘death panels,’ ‘socialized medicine’ and other red herrings yahooBuzzArticleHeadline = ‘On ‘death panels, ‘ ‘socialized medicine ‘and other red herrings’; yahooBuzzArticleSummary = ‘Article: Ain’t it a shame our so-called liberal media is obsessed with «death panels» of fevered imaginations rather than death panels that exist in the real world, notably in our present health-care system?’ ❋ Unknown (2009)

He felt that he was dying — «The taste of death,» he said to his sister-in-law, «is already on my tongue — _I taste death_; and who will be near to support my Constance if you go away?» ❋ Various (N/A)

Now, sir, he offers us nothing but unconditional submission to political death; and not political alone, but absolute _death_. ❋ American Anti-Slavery Society (N/A)

So in the next verse, «If he continue a day or two,» his death is not to be avenged by the _death_ of the _master_, as in that case the crime was to be adjudged _manslaughter_, and not ❋ American Anti-Slavery Society (N/A)

So in the next verse, «If he continue a day or two,» his death is not to be avenged by the _death_ of the _master_, as in that case the crime was to be adjudged _manslaughter_, and not _murder_. ❋ American Anti-Slavery Society (N/A)

All the distresses growing out of inequalities in human condition; as wealth and power on one side, and poverty and weakness on the other, were terminated by death; the grave brought both to a level: the small and the great are there, and there, (that is, in the grave,) he adds, the servant is free from his master; made so, evidently, by _death_. ❋ E. N. [Editor] Elliott (N/A)

So in the next verse — «If he continues a day or two,» his death shall not be avenged by the _death_ of the _master_, for in that case the crime was to be adjudged ❋ American Anti-Slavery Society (N/A)

I’m going to shut this, and it’s like the good-bye of death — a mean and ugly — _death_. ❋ Humphry Ward (1885)

— Comp. edwīt-līf. līf-bysig, adj. _ (striving for life or death), weary of life, in torment of death_: nom. sg., ❋ Robert Sharp (1879)

— Comp. edwît-lîf. lîf-bysig, adj. _ (striving for life or death), weary of life, in torment of death_: nom. sg., ❋ Robert Sharp (1879)

It only strips off the circumferential mortality, but the soul rises up untouched by it, and shakes the bands of death from off its immortal arms, and flutters the stain of death from off its budding wings, and rises fuller of life _because of death_, and mightier in its vitality in the very act of submitting the body to the law, ‘Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.’ ❋ Alexander Maclaren (1868)

«_It’s death, madam — death_, and it’s coming on me, too,» answered Miss Porter, clasping her hands over her heart, which throbbed as it never had done before, and which at last prostrated her upon the lounge. ❋ Mary Jane Holmes (1866)

The fear of death still haunted her; she lay in bed with every curtain drawn, the room lighted up with wax candles; whilst she hired watchers to sit up all night, and insisted that they should never cease talking or laughing, lest, when she woke, the fear of _death_ might come over her affrighted spirit. ❋ Philip Wharton (1847)

«‘_Thou shalt take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer which is guilty of death, but he shall surely be put to death_’,» said Wood referring to another text. ❋ William Harrison Ainsworth (1843)

— You labour some time on another subject which concerns the mode by which death was introduced, but you have said nothing about whether God _originally designed death_, or not. ❋ Hosea Ballou (1811)

Nothing appears more evident than that the death of Christ was designed for the good of mankind; and as he is the head of every man, so his death is considered, in the scriptures, a gracious benefit to every man; as the apostle expresses it, «That he, by the grace of God, should taste _death_ for every man.» ❋ Hosea Ballou (1811)

death ❋ Mlkdj (2009)

❋ Wouldnt You Like To Know (2003)

1. Joe got hit by a bus and caught death.
2. Mom: O, Jimmy, grandma isn;[t sleeping], she’s dead! Jimmy: Nooooooo!
3. Sleep: Hi, Death! Death: Yo [wusup]? Sleep: Want to come over? I have some [Tim Burton] movies u might like. Death: SWEET! K I’ll b ther in an hour. Sleep: K. ❋ The Pwn3r (2007)

[Death] is just a [part] [of life]. ❋ The_James (2008)

[She can’t] wait for death to release her from this painful and [utterly] [pointless] life. ❋ Everything’s Been Used (2018)

your only [freedom] after [marrige] ❋ Mr M (2004)

[Death] Death Death Death Death Death Death Death ❋ Chadwick Jones (2004)

*[knock knock]*
Entity at door: Hello, [my name’s] [Grim Reaper] and I’ve come to take you…
Unshaven man wearing only his boxers: Oh, your that death guy right? Ok, just wait for a second while I get my shoes.
Entity at door: No ❋ Reverend Chaos (2003)

[My life] has [finally] amounted to [something]. My death. ❋ Happy_death_elf (2009)

The end of life; the permanent [cessation] of vital [bodily functions], as [manifested] in humans by the loss of heartbeat, the absence of spontaneous breathing, and brain death. ❋ Keith Godat (2006)

• Defenition of the word death

  • The end of life.
  • The death of a person.
  • the act of killing; «he had two deaths on his conscience»
  • the personification of death; «Death walked the streets of the plague-bound city»
  • the permanent end of all life functions in an organism or part of an organism; «the animal died a painful death»
  • the absence of life or state of being dead; «he seemed more content in death than he had ever been in life»
  • the event of dying or departure from life: «her death came as a terrible shock»; «upon your decease the capital will pass to your grandchildren»
  • the time when something ends; «it was the death of all his plans»; «a dying of old hopes»
  • the end of life; continuing until dead; «he bled to death»; «a struggle to the last»
  • a final state; «he came to a bad end»; «the so-called glorious experiment came to an inglorious end»
  • the event of dying or departure from life; «her death came as a terrible shock»; «upon your decease the capital will pass to your grandchildren»
  • the time at which life ends; continuing until dead; «she stayed until his death»; «a struggle to the last»
  • the act of killing
  • the event of dying or departure from life
  • the personification of death
  • the permanent end of all life functions in an organism or part of an organism
  • the absence of life or state of being dead
  • a final state
  • the time at which life ends; continuing until dead
  • the time when something ends

Synonyms for the word death

• • bereavement
  • casualty
  • collapse
  • Death
  • decease
  • demise
  • destruction
  • downfall
  • dying
  • end
  • fall
  • fatality
  • killing
  • last
  • loss
  • loss of life
  • mortality
  • murder
  • overthrow
  • passing away
  • ruin

Similar words in the death

• • death
  • death’s
  • deathbed
  • deathbed’s
  • deathbeds
  • deathblow
  • deathblow’s
  • deathblows
  • deathless
  • deathlier
  • deathliest
  • deathlike
  • deathly
  • deathtrap
  • deathtrap’s
  • deathtraps

Meronymys for the word death

• • life
  • lifespan
  • lifetime

Hyponyms for the word death

• • brain death
  • cell death
  • cerebral death
  • cot death
  • crib death
  • Crucifixion
  • defunctness
  • departure
  • eternal rest
  • eternal sleep
  • exit
  • expiration
  • extinction
  • fatality
  • gangrene
  • going
  • grave
  • Grim Reaper
  • human death
  • infant death
  • loss
  • martyrdom
  • megadeath
  • mortification
  • necrobiosis
  • necrosis
  • neonatal death
  • passing
  • quietus
  • Reaper
  • release
  • rest
  • SIDS
  • sleep
  • sphacelus
  • sudden infant death syndrome
  • wrongful death

Hypernyms for the word death

• • alteration
  • change
  • end
  • ending
  • imaginary being
  • imaginary creature
  • kill
  • killing
  • modification
  • organic phenomenon
  • putting to death
  • state

Antonyms for the word death

• • birth
  • nascence
  • nascency
  • nativity

Idioms for the word death

• • clinical death
  • death penalty

See other words

• • What is believe
  • The definition of follow
  • The interpretation of the word beaucoup
  • What is meant by delay
  • The lexical meaning any
  • The dictionary meaning of the word eenjarig
  • The grammatical meaning of the word er
  • Meaning of the word know
  • Literal and figurative meaning of the word chercher
  • The origin of the word dairy
  • Synonym for the word deliberate
  • Antonyms for the word delight
  • Homonyms for the word occur
  • Hyponyms for the word table
  • Holonyms for the word mission
  • Hypernyms for the word chain
  • Proverbs and sayings for the word dwarf
  • Translation of the word in other languages duck

• Abkhaz: псра (pʼsra)
• Adyghe: лӏэныгъ (lˢʼenəğ)
• Afar: raba
• Afrikaans: dood (af)
• Ainu: ライ (rayi), ラヤㇺペ (rayampe)
• Albanian: vdekje (sq) f, mort (sq) m
• Amharic: ሞት (mot)
• Arabic: مَوْت‎ (ar) m (mawt), وَفَاة‎ f (wafāh)

  Egyptian Arabic: موت‎ m (mōt)

  Gulf Arabic: موت‎ m (mōt), وفاة‎ f (wafāt)

  South Levantine Arabic: موت‎ m (mōt)

• Aragonese: please add this translation if you can
• Aramaic:

  Classical Syriac: ܡܘܬܐ‎ m (mawtā)

  Jewish Aramaic: מוֹתָא‎ m (môṯā)

• Armenian: մահ (hy) (mah), վախճան (hy) (vaxčan)

  Old Armenian: մահ (mah)

• Aromanian: moarte
• Assamese: মৃত্যু (mriittu), মৰণ (moron)
• Asturian: muerte (ast) f
• Atong (India): thyiwami
• Avar: хвел (xʷel), хвей (xʷej)
• Aymara: please add this translation if you can
• Azerbaijani: ölüm (az), vəfat
• Bashkir: үлем (ülem), әжәл (äjäl)
• Basque: heriotza (eu)
• Belarusian: смерць f (smjercʹ), сьмерць f (sʹmjercʹ) (Taraškievica)
• Bengali: ইন্তেকাল (bn) (intekal), ওফাত (bn) (ofat), মৃত্যু (bn) (mrittu), মরণ (bn) (môrôṇ)
• Berber:

  Tashelhit: tamttant f

• Bislama: ded
• Bole: moto
• Breton: marv (br) m
• Bulgarian: смърт (bg) f (smǎrt)
• Burmese: မရဏ (my) (ma.ra.na.), အသေ (my) (a.se), သေခြင်း (sehkrang:)
• Buryat: үхэл (üxel)
• Catalan: mort (ca) f
• Cebuano: kamatayon
• Central Sierra Miwok: ĉam-ŝy-
• Chagatai: اولوم‎ (ölüm), اولم‎ (ölim)
• Chechen: валар (valar), ӏожалла (ˀožalla)
• Cherokee: ᎠᏲᎱᎯᏍᏗ (ayohuhisdi)
• Chichewa: imfa
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 死亡 (sei² mong⁴)

  Hakka: 死亡 (sí-mòng)

  Mandarin: 死亡 (zh) (sǐwáng)

  Min Nan: 死亡 (zh-min-nan) (sí-bông)

  Wu: 死亡 (sr vaan)

• Chuvash: вилӗм (vilĕm)
• Coptic: ⲙⲟⲩ (mou)
• Cornish: mernans m
• Crimean Tatar: ölüm, ecel
• Czech: smrt (cs) f
• Dalmatian: muart m
• Danish: død (da) c
• Dargwa: бебкӏа (bebḳa)
• Dhivehi: މަރު‎ (maru), ޥަފާތް‎ (wafāt̊)
• Dolgan: өлүү (ölüü)
• Dutch: dood (nl) m, overlijden (nl) n
• Eastern Mari: колымаш (kolymaš)
• Egyptian: (mwt f)
• Erzya: кулома (kuloma)
• Esperanto: morto (eo)
• Estonian: surm (et)
• Evenki: буни (buņi)
• Faroese: deyði m
• Finnish: kuolema (fi)
• French: mort (fr) f, décès (fr) m
• Friulian: muart f
• Gagauz: ölüm
• Galician: morte (gl) f, falecemento (gl) m, pasamento (gl) m
• Georgian: სიკვდილი (siḳvdili), გარდაცვალება (gardacvaleba), მიცვალება (micvaleba)
• German: Tod (de) m, Exitus (de) m (medical jargon)
• Gothic: 𐌳𐌰𐌿𐌸𐌿𐍃 m (dauþus)
• Greek: θάνατος (el) m (thánatos)

  Ancient: θάνατος m (thánatos), θανή f (thanḗ), τελευτή f (teleutḗ) (polite)

• Guaraní: mano (gn), e’õ, ñemano
• Gujarati: મૃત્યુ (gu) (mṛtyu), મરણ (maraṇ)
• Haitian Creole: lanmò
• Hausa: mutuwa (ha)
• Hawaiian: make
• Hebrew: מוות מָוֶת‎ (he) m (mavet), מִיתָה‎ f (mitá)
• Hindi: मृत्यु (hi) m (mŕtyu), मरण (hi) m (maraṇ), मौत (hi) f (maut), मर्ग (hi) f (marg), मरना (hi) (marnā), विनाश (hi) m (vināś), मुर्दनी (hi) f (murdanī), मुर्दन m (murdan), अंत (hi) m (ant), इंतक़ाल m (intqāl), फ़ना f (fanā), कदन (hi) m (kadan), देहांत (hi) m (dehānt), शरीरांत (hi) m (śarīrānt), विदा (hi) f (vidā), कूच (hi) m (kūc), परलोकयात्रा f (parlokyātrā), प्रस्थान (hi) m (prasthān), अजल (hi) f (ajal), कजा (hi) f (kajā), वफात (hi) f (vaphāt)
• Hittite: 𒄭𒅔𒃷 n (ḫi-in-kán), 𒀝𒂵𒀀𒋻 n (ag-ga-a-tar)
• Hungarian: halál (hu), halálozás (hu), elhalálozás (hu), holta, elhunyta
• Hunsrik: Dod m
• Icelandic: dauði (is) m, andlát (is) n, fráfall n
• Ido: morto (io)
• Indonesian: mati (id)
• Interlingua: morte
• Irish: éag m, bás (ga) m
• Istriot: muorto
• Italian: morte (it) f, dipartita (it) f, decesso (it) m, morire (it) m
• Japanese: 死 (ja) (し, shi), 死亡 (ja) (しぼう, shibō)
• Javanese: pati (jv), kepatèn
• Kabardian: лӏэныгъэ (lˢʼenəğe)
• Kalmyk: үкл (ükl)
• Kannada: ಮರಣ (kn) (maraṇa)
• Karachay-Balkar: ёлюм (yolüm), ажал (ajal), аджал (acal)
• Karakalpak: o’lim
• Karelian: kuolema, kuolenda, kuolenta, šurma
• Kashubian: smierc f
• Kazakh: өлім (kk) (ölım), ажал (ajal), қаза (qaza), опат (opat)
• Khakas: ӧлім
• Khmer: សេចក្ដីស្លាប់ (sackdəy slap), កាលកិរិយា (km) (kaalkereyaa), អនិច្ចកម្ម (ʼaʼnɨccaʼkam), ការតាយ (kaa taay)
• Korean: 죽음 (ko) (jugeum), 사망(死亡) (ko) (samang)
• Kumyk: оьлюм (ölüm)
• Kurdish:

  Central Kurdish: مەرگ‎ (ckb) (merg), وەفات‎ (ckb) (wefat)

  Northern Kurdish: mirin (ku) f, merg (ku) f, wefat (ku) f, mewt (ku) f, emrê Xwedê (ku) m

• Kyrgyz: өлүм (ky) (ölüm), ажал (ky) (ajal)
• Ladin: mort f
• Lao: ຄວາມຕາຍ (khuām tāi), ການຕາຍ (kān tāi), ມໍລະນະ (mǭ la na)
• Latgalian: nuove
• Latin: mors (la) f, nex (la) f, exitium n, quietus m, letum (la) n, finis (la) m or f, obitus m, funus (la) n
• Latvian: nāve f, miršana f
• Laz: ღურა (ğura)
• Lithuanian: mirtis (lt) f
• Lombard: mort (lmo)
• Low German:

  Dutch Low Saxon: dood (nds) m

  German Low German: Dood (nds) m

• Loxicha Zapotec: please add this translation if you can
• Luxembourgish: Doud (lb)
• Macedonian: смрт (mk) f (smrt)
• Malay: kematian (ms)
• Malayalam: മരണം (ml) (maraṇaṃ)
• Maltese: mewt f
• Manx: baase m
• Maori: mate (mi), mate kiatu (death by violence), mate tara-ā-whare (death from natural causes), mate whawhati tata (sudden death), mate koeo (natural death), hautapu (by violence)
• Marathi: मरण (mr) n (maraṇ), मृत्यू (mr) m (mrutyū)
• Mingrelian: ღურა (ɣura)
• Mirandese: muorte f
• Moksha: кулома (kuloma)
• Mongolian:

  Cyrillic: үхэл (mn) (üxel)

• Nahuatl: miquiztli (nah)
• Inuktitut: ᐋᔪᐃᓕᖅᑐᖅ (aayoiliqtoq), ᑐᖁᓂᖅ (iu) (toqoniq)
• Navajo: aniné, anoonééł
• Neapolitan: morte f
• Nepali: मृत्यु (mr̥tyu), मरण (maraṇ)
• Ngazidja Comorian: wafati, hufa, mauti class 9/10, mfo class 3, mfariki
• Nogai: оьлим (ölim)
• Norman: mort f, décès m
• Northern Sami: jápmin
• Northern Yukaghir: йабал (jabal)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: død (no) m, dødsfall n, ende (no) m

  Nynorsk: daude m, dødsfall n

• Occitan: mort (oc) f, mòrt (oc) f
• Old Church Slavonic:

  Cyrillic: съмрьть f (sŭmrĭtĭ)

• Old East Slavic: съмьрть f (sŭmĭrtĭ)
• Old English: dēaþ m
• Old French: mort f
• Old Norse: dauði m
• Old Prussian: gals
• Oriya: ମରଣ (or) (môrôṇô), ମୃତ୍ୟୁ (or) (mrutyu)
• Oromo: du’a
• Ossetian: мӕлӕт (mælæt)
• Ottoman Turkish: اولوم‎ (ölüm), موت‎ (mevt), مرگ‎ (merg)
• Pali: maraṇa
• Pashto: مرګ‎ m (marg)
• Persian: موت‎ (fa) (mowt), مرگ‎ (fa) (marg), وفات‎ (fa) (vafât), درگذشت‎ (fa) (dargozašt)
• Phoenician: 𐤌𐤅𐤕‎ (mwt)
• Piedmontese: mòrt f
• Polish: śmierć (pl) f, zgon (pl) m
• Portuguese: morte (pt) f, falecimento (pt), óbito (pt)
• Punjabi: ਮੌਤ (pa) (maut), ਜਮ m (jam)
• Purepecha: uarhikua
• Quechua: wañu
• Romanian: moarte (ro) f
• Russian: смерть (ru) f (smertʹ), ги́бель (ru) f (gíbelʹ), поги́бель (ru) f (pogíbelʹ), кончи́на (ru) f (končína)
• Rusyn: смерть f (smertʹ)
• Saho: raba
• Sanskrit: मृत्यु (sa) m (mṛtyú), मरण (sa) n (maraṇa), निर्वाण (sa) n (nirvāṇa), मार (sa) m (māra), मोक्ष (sa) m (mokṣa), अन्त (sa) m (anta), काल (sa) m (kāla), मृत (sa) m (mṛta), अभाव (sa) m (abhāva)
• Santali: ᱢᱳᱨᱳᱱ (moron)
• Sardinian: molte, morte, morti f
• Scots: daith
• Scottish Gaelic: bàs m, caochladh m, eug m
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: смр̏т f, поги́бија f (in battle)

  Roman: smȑt (sh) f, pogíbija (sh) f (in battle)

• Shor: ӧлӱш (ölüş)
• Sicilian: morti (scn) f
• Silesian: śmiyrć f
• Sindhi: وَفاتِ‎ (vafāti)
• Sinhalese: මරණය (maraṇaya)
• Skolt Sami: jäämmʼmõš
• Slovak: smrť (sk) f
• Slovene: smrt (sl) f
• Somali: dhimasho
• Sorbian:

  Lower Sorbian: smjerś f

  Upper Sorbian: smjerć f

• Southern Altai: ӧлӱм (ölüm)
• Yucatec Maya: kíimili’
• Spanish: muerte (es) f
• Svan: დაგარ (dagar)
• Swahili: kifo (sw)
• Swedish: död (sv) c
• Tabasaran: аьжал (a̱žal)
• Tagalog: kamatayan
• Tajik: марг (tg) (marg), вафот (vafot)
• Tamil: மரணம் (ta) (maraṇam)
• Tatar: үлем (tt) (ülem), әҗәл (tt) (äcäl)
• Telugu: మరణము (te) (maraṇamu), చావు (te) (cāvu)
• Thai: ความตาย (th) (kwaam-dtaai), มรณะ (th) (mɔɔ-rá-ná)
• Tibetan: འཆི་བ (‘chi ba)
• Tigrinya: ሞት (mot)
• Tocharian B: srukelle
• Tongan: mate
• Tupinambá: eõ
• Turkish: ölüm (tr), mevt (tr), memat (tr) (archaic), vefat (tr), irtihal (tr) (archaic)
• Turkmen: ölüm (tk), ajal (tk)
• Tuvan: өлүм (ölüm)
• Udmurt: кулон (kulon), кулэм (kulem)
• Ukrainian: смерть (uk) f (smertʹ)
• Umbundu: kalunga
• Urdu: موت‎ f (maut), مرگ‎ f (marg), مرت‎ m (mritu)
• Uyghur: ئۆلۈم‎ (ölüm)
• Uzbek: oʻlim (uz), ajal (uz), vafot (uz), mamot (uz)
• Venetian: morte f
• Vietnamese: (cái, sự) chết (vi), tử vong (vi)
• Volapük: deadam (vo)
• Walloon: moirt (wa) f
• Welsh: marwolaeth (cy) f, angau (cy) m, tranc m
• West Frisian: dea m
• Wolof: dee (wo)
• Xhosa: ukufa
• Yakut: өлүү (ölüü)
• Yiddish: טויט‎ m (toyt), מוות‎ m (moves), מיתה‎ f (mise)
• Yoruba: ikú
• Zhuang: daindangdumz, daindangndaek
• Zulu: ukufa

death

 (dĕth)

n.

1. The act of dying; termination of life.

2. The state of being dead.

3. The cause of dying: Drugs were the death of him.

4. A manner of dying: a heroine’s death.

5. often Death A personification of the destroyer of life, usually represented as a skeleton holding a scythe.

6.

a. Bloodshed; murder.

b. Execution.

7. Law Civil death.

8. The termination or extinction of something: the death of imperialism.

Idioms:

at death’s door

Near to death; gravely ill or injured.

be the death of

To distress or irritate to an intolerable degree.

death on

Opposed to or strict about: Our boss is death on casual dressing.

to death

To an intolerable degree; extremely: worried to death.

to the death

Until one participant in a fight or struggle has died or been killed.

---

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

death

(dɛθ)

n

1. the permanent end of all functions of life in an organism or some of its cellular components

2. an instance of this: his death ended an era.

3. a murder or killing: he had five deaths on his conscience.

4. termination or destruction: the death of colonialism.

5. a state of affairs or an experience considered as terrible as death: your constant nagging will be the death of me.

6. a cause or source of death

7. (Art Terms) (usually capital) a personification of death, usually a skeleton or an old man holding a scythe

8.

a. to death to the death until dead: bleed to death; a fight to the death.

b. to death excessively: bored to death.

9. (Medicine) at death’s door likely to die soon

10. (Medicine) catch one’s death catch one’s death of cold informal to contract a severe cold

11. do to death

a. to kill

b. to overuse (a joke, etc) so that it no longer has any effect

12. (Hunting) present when an animal that is being hunted is caught and killed

13. present at the finish or climax

14. (Medicine) like death warmed up informal very ill

15. like grim death as if afraid for one’s life

16. (Law) put to death to kill deliberately or execute

[Old English dēath; related to Old High German tōd death, Gothic dauthus]

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

death

(dɛθ)

n.

1. the act of dying; the end of life. Compare brain death.

2. the state of being dead.

3. extinction; destruction.

4. (usu. cap.) the agent of death personified, usu. represented as the Grim Reaper.

5. loss or absence of spiritual life.

6. massacre; mayhem.

7. a cause of death: You’ll be the death of me yet!

Idioms:

1. at death’s door, in serious danger of dying; gravely ill.

2. do to death, to do so often that boredom or staleness sets in.

3. put to death, to kill; execute.

4. to death, to an intolerable degree: sick to death of working.

[before 900; Middle English deeth, Old English dēath; c. Old High German tōd, akin to die¹]

Random House Kernerman Webster’s College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.

Death

an obsession with suicide.

the cloth or clothing in which the dead are wrapped for burial or other form of funeral.

a place where the cremated remains of the dead are stored. — cinerary, adj.

a vault where the remains of cremated bodies are kept, usually in one of a number of recesses in a wall.

a place where cremations are done.

1. an inscription on a monument, as on a gravestone.
2. a short piece of prose or verse written in honor of a dead person. — epitaphial, epitaphian, epitaphic, adj.

the deliberate killing of painfully ill or terminally ill people to put them out of their misery. Also called mercy killing.

the science of putting people to death.

1. the state or quality of being on the verge of death.
2. close to extinction or stagnant. — moribund, adj.

an improvised funeral song, composed for the dead and sung by women in modern Greece. — myriologist, n. — myriologic, myriological, adj.

the worship of the dead.

1. an announcement of death; obituary.
2. a list of persons who have died within a certain time. Also necrologue. — necrologist, n.

1. the magie practiced by a witch or sorcerer.
2. a form of divination through communication with the dead; the black art. Also nigromancy. — necromancer, necromant, nigromancien, n. — necromantie, adj.

an obsession with death or the dead.

an abnormal condition in which a person believes himself dead.

an abnormal, often sexual attraction toward the dead or a dead body. — necrophile, n.

an abnormal fear of death. Also called thanatophobia.

the death or decay of body tissue, the result of loss of blood supply or trauma. — necrotic, adj.

Rare. any learning that pertains to the dead.

a place or receptacle for the bones of the dead. Also called ossuary.

an excessive interest in graves and cemeteries.

resembling death; deathly.

the study of death or the dead. Also thanatism. — thanatological, adj.

an obsession with death. See also necromania.

necrophobia.

a survey of or meditation upon death.

the Eucharist given to one about to die; last rites or extreme unction. — viatic, viatical, adj.

-Ologies & -Isms. Copyright 2008 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

Death

 

See Also: ADVANCING; BEGINNINGS/ENDINGS; DEATH, DEFINED; DEATH, FINALITY OF; ENTRANCES/EXITS; SUDDENNESS; TIMELINESS

1. As death comes on we are like trees growing in the sandy bank of a widening river —Bhartrihari
2. The body of Benjamin Franklin, Printer, like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out, and stripped of its lettering and gilding, lies here, food for worms —Benjamin Franklin

   Franklin’s epitaph for himself is a fine example of appropriately suiting the comparison to what’s being compared.

3. (Kill him) dead as a beef —William Faulkner
4. [Sexual feelings] dead as a burned-out cinder —Ellen Glasgow
5. Death arrives … sudden as a pasteboard box crushed by a foot —Marge Piercy
6. Death falling like snow on any head it chooses —Philip Levine
7. Death fell round me like a rain of steel —Herbert Read

   A simile from one of Read’s many war poems, Meditation of the Waking English Officer.

8. Death has many times invited me: it was like the salt invisible in the waves —Pablo Neruda
9. Death lies on her, like an untimely frost —William Shakespeare
10. Death, like roulette, turning our wish to its will —George Barker
11. Death lurking up the road like a feral dog abroad in the swirling snow —Marge Piercy
12. Death, you can never tell where else it will crop up —John Hale
13. Die alone like a dog in a ditch —Aldous Huxley

    See Also: ABANDONMENT, ALONENESS

14. Died in beauty, like a rose blown from its parent stem —CD. Sillery
15. Die like candles in a draft —Sharon Sheehe Stark

    In the short story, The Johnstown Polka, the simile has a literal frame of reference; specifically, a room in an old age home which is overheated because to open the windows would kill the people in it.

16. Died like flies in a sugar bowl —Rita Mae Brown
17. (I won’t) drown like a rat in a trap —George Bernard Shaw
18. Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast flaying cloud, a flash of lightning, a break of the wave, man passes from life to his rest in the grave —William Knox
19. Dying is as natural as living —Thomas Fuller
20. Dying like flies —Anon

    An even more frequently used variation is to “Drop like flies.”

21. (I will) encounter darkness as a bride —William Shakespeare
22. (You couldn’t) expect death to come rushing in like a skivvy because you’d rung the bell —Paul Barker
23. Feel my death rushing towards me like an express train —John Updike
24. Felt death near, like a garment she had left hanging in her closet and could not see or find, though she knew it was there —Abraham Rothberg
25. Go to their graves like flowers or creeping worms —Percy Bysshe Shelley
26. The intimations of mortality appear so gradually as to be imperceptible, like the first graying in of twilight —Richard Selzer
27. Like a clock worn out with eating time, the wheels of weary life at last stood still —John Dryden
28. Like a led victim, to my death I’ll go —John Dryden
29. Like sheep they are laid in the grave —The Holy Bible/Psalms
30. (I now) look at death, the way we look at a house we plan to move into —William Bronk
31. Men fear death, as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other —Francis Bacon
32. Our fear of death is like our fear that summer will be short, but when we have had our swing of pleasure, our fill of fruit, and our swelter of heat, we say we have had our day —Ralph Waldo Emerson
33. Passed away, as a dry leaf passes into leaf mold —John Updike
34. [In old age] the shadow of death … like a sword of Damocles, may descend at any moment —Samuel Butler
35. She passed away like morning dew —Hartley Coleridge
36. Talking over the fact of his approaching death as though it were a piece of property for agreeable disposition in the family —Elizabeth Spencer
37. There are no graves that grow so green as the graves of children —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

    From a letter of condolence to W. R. Sturtevant, September 17, 1878, in which the simile continues as follows: “Their memory comes back after a time more beautiful than that of those who leave us at any other age.”

    See Also: CHILDREN

38. We are all kept and fed for death, like a herd of swine to be slain without reason —Palladas
39. We end our years like a sigh … for it is speedily gone, and we fly away —The Holy Bible/Psalms
40. Wherever you go, death dogs you like a shadow —Anon, probably dating back to before Christ.

Similes Dictionary, 1st Edition. © 1988 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

Death

 

big jump An American cowboy who dies is said to have taken the big jump.

bite the dust To die; to come a cropper; to suffer defeat; to fail. The image created by the phrase is one of death: a warrior or soldier falling from a horse and literally biting the dust. In 1697, Dryden used the phrase in his translation of Virgil’s Aeneid.

So many Valiant Heros bite the Ground.

Western stories popularized the phrase in expressions such as “many a redskin bit the dust that day” (Webster’s Third). It is also said to have gained currency during World War II in R.A.F. circles. Today the phrase is used figuratively in reference to the defeat, disaster, or failure of a person or something closely associated with a person. One who is defeated is said to bite the dust, but rarely is the phrase used seriously in regard to someone’s death.

bless the world with one’s heels To suffer death by hanging. The bless of the expression carries its obsolete meaning ‘to wave or brandish,’ a meaning Dr. Johnson conjectured derived from the action of benediction when the celebrant blesses the congregation with the monstrance. In somewhat similar fashion a hanging man blesses the world with his heels.

buy it To be killed; to die prematurely as a result of a tragedy. Buy it is a witty way of saying “pay for it with one’s life.” The phrase dates from the early 19th century when it was used primarily in military circles.

The wings and fuselage, with fifty-three bullet holes, caused us to realize on our return how near we had been to “buying it.” (W. Noble, With Bristol Fighter Squadron, 1920)

Today this British slang phrase is used in nonmilitary contexts as well.

buy the box To die, or be as good as dead. Many people buy their own coffins in order to spare their families the expense and trauma of the funeral and burial arrangements. The irony of “preparing for death” probably gave rise to this irreverent slang expression, the implication being that once a person “buys the box,” he might as well be dead.

buy the farm To die; to be shot down and killed. The origin of this British slang phrase has been attributed to British pilots who were wont to say that when “it was all over,” they were “going to settle down and buy a farm.” Many pilots were never able to realize this dream because they were shot down and killed. Thus, buy the farm became a euphemism for ‘die’ because of the glaring disparity between the idealized dream cherished by the pilots and the tragic reality of the death they experienced.

cash in one’s chips To die, to pass on or away. Also cash or pass or hand in one’s checks. In use since the 1870s, this expression is a reference to the card game of poker, in which a player turns in his chips or checks to the banker in exchange for cash at the end of the game.

cross the Great Divide To die; to go west; to cross the Styx. Cross over is a euphemistic way of saying ‘to die.’ Cross the Great Divide is a longer, more emphatic, but still euphemistic way of saying the same thing. Here the “Great Divide” is being used figuratively to refer to the illusory line between life and death. At one time, the unsettled area referred to as the “West”—across the Great Divide or Continental Divide —represented the “Great Unknown,” and heading in that direction came to mean risking one’s life.

curtains See TERMINATION.

dance on air To be hanged; also dance on nothing. A person who is hanged may undergo involuntary muscle contractions. These jerky movements resemble dancing of a sort. Similar expressions include dance in the rope and dance the Tyburn jig, the latter in reference to Tyburn, a place for public executions in London, England.

If any of them chanced to be made dance in the rope, they thought him happy to be so freed of the care and trouble [that] attends the miserable indigent. (Sorel’s Comical History of Francion, 1655)

Just as the felon condemned to die …
From his gloomy cell in a vision elopes,
To caper on sunny greens and slopes,
Instead of the dance upon nothing. (Thomas Hood, Kilmansegg, Her Death, 1840)

dead as a doornail Dead, very dead, deader than dead; inoperative with no hope of repair. Many houses formerly had a heavy metal knocker on the front door. A doornail was a large, heavy-headed spike sometimes used as a striker plate against which the knocker was struck to increase its loudness and prevent damage to the door. Since the doornail was continually being struck on the head, it was assumed that nothing could be deader.

Old Marley was as dead as a doornail. (Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol, 1843)

As knockers (and doornails) became less common, the word doorknob was often substituted in the expression. Other expressions such as dumb as a doornail and deaf as a doornail imply that someone is extremely stupid or stone deaf, respectively.

debt to nature Death. The implication is that life is a loan and, with or without interest, it must be paid off with death. Pay one’s debt to nature means to die. Both these expressions, common since the Middle Ages, have been used as euphemistic epitaphs on tombstones, particularly those from the early 20th century.

Pay nature’s debt with a cheerful countenance. (Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, approx. 1593)

die for want of lobster sauce See EXCESSIVENESS.

die in harness To die while working or while in the middle of some action, especially while fighting. The allusion may be to a horse who drops dead while still in harness, as a plowhorse working a field. Another possibility is that harness is used in the archaic sense of armor for men or horses, as in the following passage from Shakespeare’s Macbeth:

At least we’ll die with harness on our back. (V,v)

Two similar phrases are to die in the saddle and to die with one’s boots on. The latter dates from the late 19th century and formerly meant to die a violent death, especially by hanging. To die in the saddle brings to mind cavalry or mounted soldiers while to die with one’s boots on conjures up images of foot soldiers, as in the following citation:

They died with their boots on; they hardly ever surrendered. (Listener Magazine, 1959)

die like Roland See HUNGER.

feed the fishes To die by drowning.

food for worms A dead and interred body; a corpse or carcass. The source of this saying is obvious. Another expression of similar zoological origin is food for fishes, referring to one dead from drowning.

He was food for fishes now, poor fellow. (Rider Haggard, Mr. Meson’s Will, 1894)

give up the ghost To die, to expire, to breathe one’s last. Ghost refers to one’s soul or spirit, the essence of life. The expression is Biblical in origin:

But man dieth, and wasteth away: yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? (Job 14:10)

go belly up An American slang expression meaning to die and float belly up in the manner of dead fish. It is used figuratively for any failure or nonsuc-cess, just as death is.

go the way of all flesh To die. This expression is of Biblical origin:

And, behold, this day I am going the way of all the Earth. (Joshua 23:14)

The phrase’s evolution to its present form with flesh substituted for the Earth is not fully understood by modern scholars. The expression appeared in The Golden Age by Thomas Hey-wood (1611):

Whether I had better go home by land, or by sea? If I go by land and miscarry, then I go the way of all flesh.

go west To expire, die. This expression, obviously derived from the setting of the sun in the west, may be traced to the ancient Egyptian belief that their dead resided west of the Nile River. In addition, whites who traveled west of the Mississippi during the frontier days were considered fair game for Indians; hence, in the United States “going west” became synonymous with dying. The use of this expression has decreased since its heyday during World War I.

I shall once again be in the company of dear old friends now ‘gone west.’ (E. Corri, Thirty Years as a Boxing Referee, 1915)

have [someone’s] number on it See DESTINY.

join the majority To die; to pass on or away. Also join the great majority, go or pass over to the majority, death joins us to the great majority. Based on the Latin phrase abiit ad plures, this expression and variants have been in use since the early 18th century.

kick the bucket To die. Although several explanations as to the origin of this expression have been advanced, the most plausible states that the phrase came from an old custom of hanging slaughtered pigs by their heels from a beam, or bucket, as it is known in parts of England. In use since 1785, this irreverent synonym for to die is popular in both England and America. Shorter variations include kick, kick off, and kick in.

leap in the dark An action of unknown consequences; a blind venture; death. The last words of Thomas Hobbes, philosopher and translator (1588-1679), are reputed to have been:

Now am I about to take my last voyage—a great leap in the dark.

make a hole in the water To commit suicide by drowning. The hole in this expression refers to a grave. To make a hole in the water, then, is to go to a watery grave intentionally. This slang phrase, rarely heard today, dates from the mid-19th century.

Why I don’t go and make a hole in the water I don’t know. (Charles Dickens, Bleak House, 1853)

make [someone’s] beard See DOMINATION.

necktie party A lynching or hanging; also necktie social, necktie sociable, necktie frolic. This euphemistic and irreverent American slang expression, popularized by western movies, is an extension of the slang necktie ‘hangman’s rope.’

Mr. Jim Clemenston, equine abductor, was on last Thursday morning, at ten sharp, made the victim of a neck-tie sociable. (Harper’s Magazine, November, 1871)

[one’s] number is up A person is about to die—one is done for, one’s time has come. At an earlier date, number referred to one’s lottery number; currently, the full expression refers euphemistically to death.

Fate had dealt him a knock-out blow; his number was up. (P. G. Wodehouse, Girl on Boat, 1922)

This expression was common among American soldiers who may have been the first to use it in speaking of death.

peg out To die; to bite the dust. In cribbage, the game is finished when a player pegs out the last hole. This expression is among the less frequently heard euphemisms for death.

Harrison … was then 67 … and actually pegged out in 1841. (H. L. Mencken, in The New Yorker, October 1, 1949)

push up daisies To be dead and buried in one’s grave; also turn one’s toes up to the daisies and under the daisies. The reference is to the flowers often planted on top of new graves. The expression and variants have been in use since the mid-19th century.

sprout wings See CHARITABLENESS.

step off To die; to be married. The expression’s latter sense, often extended to step off the carpet, refers to the conclusion of the bride’s procession to the altar. The phrase’s former, more common, meaning is an allusion to the last footstep of life.

The old man and I are both due to step off if we’re caught. (Dashiell Hammett, Blood Money, 1927)

take for a ride To murder; to deceive or cheat; to pull someone’s leg. This underworld euphemism for ‘murder’ dates from the early 1900s. Gangsters first abducted their victims, then took them to a secluded area where they were murdered.

The gang believes he is getting yellow-or soft, and usually takes him for a ride…. (Emanuel H. La vine, The Third Degree, 1930)

Take for a ride also means ‘deceive, cheat’ because the driver is in a position to manipulate or trick. The expression is often used of one who leads another on and then fleeces him.

But the one who really took my friend for a ride was the electrician. He used more … cable … than … it takes to build a battle ship. (Roger W. Babson, in a syndicated newspaper column, 1951)

turn one’s face to the wall To die; more precisely, to make the final gesture of acquiescence indicating that one is about to give up the ghost. The origin is Biblical (2 Kings 22:2); when Hezekiah was informed his death was imminent:

He turned his face to the wall, and prayed unto the Lord.

The expression appears in works as varied as Narratives of the Days of the Reformation (1579):

He turned his face to the wall in the said belfry; and so after his prayers slept sweetly in the lord.

and Tom’sawyer (1876):

He would turn his face to the wall, and die with that word unsaid. (Mark Twain)

Picturesque Expressions: A Thematic Dictionary, 1st Edition. © 1980 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

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• Death

Definitions of death word

• variable noun death Death is the permanent end of the life of a person or animal. 3
• countable noun death A particular kind of death is a particular way of dying. 3
• singular noun death The death of something is the permanent end of it. 3
• noun death the permanent end of all functions of life in an organism or some of its cellular components 3
• noun death an instance of this 3
• noun death a murder or killing 3

Information block about the term

Origin of death

First appearance:

before 900

One of the 4% oldest English words

before 900; Middle English deeth, Old English dēath; cognate with German Tod, Gothic dauthus; akin to Old Norse deyja to die1; see -th1

Historical Comparancy

Parts of speech for Death

death popularity

A common word. It’s meaning is known to most children of preschool age. About 99% of English native speakers know the meaning and use the word.

Most Europeans know this English word. The frequency of it’s usage is somewhere between «mom» and «screwdriver».

Synonyms for death

noun death

• ruination — the act or state of ruining or the state of being ruined.
• decease — death
• downfall — descent to a lower position or standing; overthrow; ruin.
• dissolution — the act or process of resolving or dissolving into parts or elements.
• repose — the state of reposing or being at rest; rest; sleep.

adjective death

• funerary — of or relating to a funeral or burial: a funerary urn.
• obituary — a notice of the death of a person, often with a biographical sketch, as in a newspaper.

Antonyms for death

noun death

• accomplishment — An accomplishment is something remarkable that has been done or achieved.
• success — the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors; the accomplishment of one’s goals.
• commencement — The commencement of something is its beginning.
• introduction — the act of introducing or the state of being introduced.
• consciousness — Your consciousness is your mind and your thoughts.

Top questions with death

• what happening after death?
• what happen after death?
• what happens after death?
• what happened after death?
• who said give me liberty or give me death?
• where is death valley?
• what is death?
• death where is your sting?
• how many states have the death penalty?
• the death of superman lives what happened?
• what states have the death penalty?
• what is the death penalty?

See also

• All definitions of death
• Synonyms for death
• Antonyms for death
• Related words to death
• Sentences with the word death
• Words that rhyme with death
• death pronunciation
• The plural of death

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