death
/dɛθ
/- It is a sad fact that these deaths are now so commonplace that they rarely make the news.
- There is no family history of sudden infant deaths and everything had seemed okay.
- It is estimated that around one fifth of all deaths in the UK are attributed to smoking.
Synonyms
- So tranquil appeared the manly features in the repose of death, that some moments had passed ere those around could believe that the patriarch was no more.
- The bad part of grief is that it, like death, lasts forever.
- Mutations can affect genes that control the birth or death of cells.
- Roots of this length have not initiated physiological death processes, and include a mass of mitotic cells.
- Ah, they told themselves, Reaper, the Minion of Death, is back in town.
- One short sleep, we wake eternally, and Death shall be no more: Death, thou shalt die!
Synonyms
- Cinema's birth or rebirth is intimately linked to its death and the process of its mourning.
- The death of the American auto industry -- and the loss of hundreds of thousands of high-paying union jobs -- isn't necessarily a bad thing for the environment if it means more market share for more efficient Japanese vehicles.
- The Mighty Ed Driscoll has a terrific post on the death of the smart romantic comedy, inspired by a piece by A.O. Scott.
Synonyms
- What they did was create a situation where if you are a high school student, it is social death to have a mobile phone that is not a Nokia.
- Being a Classics teacher is not the social death it was twenty-five years ago.
- Playing the lone wolf is gutsy, but be prepared for professional and social death.
Phrases
as sure as death
at death's door
be the death of
be in at the death
catch one's death (of cold)
do someone to death
do something to death
a fate worse than death
like death warmed up (or over)
a matter of life and death
put someone to death
till (or until) death us do part
to death
to the death
Derivatives
deathlike
/ adjective ...- Hester's face is an almost deathlike pale mask.
- Because in the face of all this death and deathlike cynicism, love is the one impulse in our repertoire that says the world is unfinished.
- That's why I sank into a deathlike peace one recent night in Northern Ontario, as midnight ushered in the longest day of the year.
Origin
Old English dēath, of Germanic origin; related to Dutch dood and German Tod, also to die1.
dead from Old English:
Dead is related to Dutch dood and German Tod ‘death’, and to death itself. Their shared ancestor is the origin of die. Often it is not enough to be dead: someone must be as dead as a doornail or as a dodo. The comparison with the extinct dodo is understandable enough, but it is not clear why doornails are particularly associated with death. A doornail was one of the large iron studs that were once used on doors to give additional strength or simply for decoration. It may also have been the large stud struck by the knocker, which, subject to constant pounding, could be considered well and truly dead. The phrase goes back to the Middle Ages and was used by Shakespeare, in whose time a person could also be as dead as a herring. Death has prompted many reflections on the human condition. The Roman poet Claudian wrote omnia mors aequat, ‘death levels all’—in English death is the great leveller. Shakespeare's The Tempest contains the line ‘He that dies pays all debts’, a thought that had become death pays all debts by the time of the novelist Sir Walter Scott. That nothing is certain but death and taxes has been a view since the early 18th century. The original deadline (mid 19th century) was a line drawn around a military prison, beyond which any prisoner was liable to be shot. It is first mentioned in a document of the 1860s.