Thanatology

//θan.əˈtɒl.əd͡ʒ.i// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The scientific study of death and the practices associated with it, including the study of the needs of the terminally ill and their families. uncountable, usually

    "Meronym: mortuary science"

  2. 2
    the branch of science that studies death (especially its social and psychological aspects) wordnet

Example

More examples

"The work is part of a growing field called comparative thanatology — the study of how different animals react to death."

Etymology

From thanato- + -logy, from Ancient Greek θάνατος (thánatos, “death”).

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