Death (redirected from Mrityu)

death, cessation of all life (metabolic) processes. Death may involve the organism as a whole (somatic death) or may be confined to cells and tissues within the organism. Causes of death in human beings include injury, acute or chronic disease, and neoplasia (cancer). The physiological death of cells that are normally replaced throughout life is called necrobiosis; the death of cells caused by external changes, such as an abnormal lack of blood supply, is called necrosis.

Somatic death is characterized by the discontinuance of cardiac activity and respiration, and eventually leads to the death of all body cells from lack of oxygen, although for approximately six minutes after somatic death—a period referred to as clinical death—a person whose vital organs have not been damaged may be revived. However, achievements of modern biomedical technology have enabled the physician to artificially maintain critical functions for indefinite periods.

Somatic death is followed by a number of irreversible changes that are of legal importance, especially in estimating the time of death. These include rigor mortis, livor mortis (discoloration of the body due to settling of blood), algor mortis (cooling of the body), autolysis (breakdown of tissue by enzymes liberated by that tissue after death), and putrefaction (invasion of the body by organisms from the gastrointestinal tract).

Brain death, which is now a legal condition in most states for declared death, requires that the following be absent for at least 12 hours: behavioral or reflex motor functions above the neck, including pupillary reflexes to testing jaw reflex, gag reflex, response to noxious stimuli, and any spontaneous respiratory movement. Purely spinal reflexes can remain. If the patient has agreed to be an organ donor, the observation period can be shortened to 6 hours.

As a result of recent refinements in organ transplantation (see transplantation, medical) techniques, the need has arisen to more precisely define medical death. The current definition is that of a 1981 U.S. presidential commission, which recommended that death be defined as "irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem," the brain stem being that part of the brain that controls breathing and other basic body functions. Some feel, however, that people in persistent vegetative states, i.e., people who have brain-stem function but have lost higher brain functions (vision, abstract thought, personality), should be considered dead and allowed, through living wills or relatives, to donate organs.

See euthanasia; funeral customs; vital statistics.

Bibliography

See E. Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying (1969); S. B. Nuland, How We Die (1994).

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Death

Ah Puch

deity of doom; represented as bloated corpse or skeleton. [Maya Myth.: Leach, 30]

Ankou

gaunt driver of spectral cart; collects the dead. [Brittany Folklore: Leach, 62]

Anubis

god and guardian of the dead. [Ancient Egyptian Rel.: Parrinder, 10]

Arrow of Azrael

angel of death’s way of summoning dead. [Islamic Myth.: Jobes, 129]

As I Lay Dying

Bundren family ordeal after Addie’s death. [Am. Lit.: Faulkner As I Lay Dying]

asphodel flower

bloom growing in Hades. [Gk. Myth.: Kravitz, 37]

Atropos

Fate who cuts thread of life. [Gk. and Rom. Myth.: Hall, 302]

Azrael

angel of death; separates the soul from the body. [Islamic Myth.: Walsh Classical, 41]

banshee

female specter, harbinger of death. [Irish and Welsh Myth.: Walsh Classical, 45]

bell

passing bell; rung to indicate demise. [Christian Tradition: Jobes, 198]

black

Western color for mourning. [Christian Color Symbolism: Leach, 242; Jobes, 357]

Bodach Glas

gray specter; equivalent to Irish banshee. [Scot. Myth.: Walsh Classical, 45]

Bran

god whose cauldron restored dead to life. [Welsh Myth.: Jobes, 241]

Bury the Dead

six dead soldiers cause a rebellion when they refuse to be buried. [Am. Drama: Haydn & Fuller, 768]

Calvary

(Golgotha) where Christ was crucified. [N.T.: Luke 23:33]

Cer

goddess of violent death. [Gk. Myth.: Kravitz, 75]

Charun

god of death. [Etruscan Myth.: Jobes, 315]

Conqueror Worm

the worm ultimately vanquishes man in grave. [Am. Lit.: “Ligeia” in Tales of Terror]

Dance of Death

Holbein woodcut, one of many medieval examples of the death motif. [Eur. Culture: Bishop, 363-367]

danse macabre

Dance of Death; procession of all on their way to the grave. [Art: Osborne, 299–300, 677]

dust and ashes

“I am become like dust and ashes.” [O.T.: Job 30:19]

Endgame

blind and chair-bound, Hamm learns that nearly everybody has died; his own parents are dying in separate trash cans. [Anglo-Fr. Drama: Beckett Endgame in Weiss, 143]

Ereshkigal

goddess of death; consort of Nergal. [Sumerian and Akkadian Myth.: Parrinder, 93]

extreme unction

Roman Catholic sacrament given to a person in danger of dying. [Christianity: RHD, 506]

Gibbs, Emily

dying in childbirth, welcomed by the other spirits in the graveyard, she tries to relive her twelfth birthday. [Am. Drama: Thornton Wilder Our Town in Benét, 747]

Grim Reaper

name given to personification of death. [Pop. Culture: Misc.]

handful of earth

symbol of mortality. [Folklore: Jobes, 486]

horse

symbol of agents of destruction. [Christian Tradition: N.T.: Revelation 6; Mercatante, 65]

Ilyitch, Ivan

afflicted with cancer, he becomes irritable, visits many doctors, gradually disintegrates, and dies almost friendless. [Russ. Lit.: Tolstoy The Death of Ivan Ilyitch in Magill III, 256]

Kali

Hindu goddess to whom Thug sacrificed victims. [Hinduism: Brewer Dictionary, 600]

Krook

rag dealer dies spectacularly and horribly of “spontaneous combustion.” [Br. Lit.: Dickens Bleak House]

Lenore

“saintly soul floats on the Stygian river.” [Am. Lit.: “Lenore” in Hart, 468]

Lord of the Flies

showing man’s consciousness and fear of dying. [Br. Lit.: Lord of the Flies]

manes

spirits of the dead. [Rom. Rel.: Leach, 672]

Mania

ancient Roman goddess of the dead. [Rom. Myth.: Zimmerman, 159]

Niflheim

dark, cold region to which were sent those who died of disease or old age. [Scand. Myth.: Brewer Dictionary 642]

nightingale

identified with mortality. [Animal Symbolism: Mercatante, 163]

On Borrowed Time

an old man chases “Death” up a tree and keeps him there until the old man is ready to die. [Am. Drama: Sobel, 517]

pale horse

fourth horse of Apocolypse, ridden by Death personified. [N.T.: Revelation 7:7–8]

Pardoner’s Tale, The

seeking to slay death, three rioters are told he is under a certain tree; there they find gold and kill each other over it. [Br. Lit.: Chaucer “The Pardoner’s Tale” in Canterbury Tales]

Requiem

religious mass (music or spoken) for the dead. [Christianity: Payton, 568]

“Rime of the Ancient Mariner, The”

when Death wins the toss of the dice, the two hundred crew members drop dead. [Br. Poetry: Coleridge “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”]

Sacco Benedetto

yellow robe worn going to the stake during Inquisition. [Span. Hist.: Brewer Dictionary, 948]

scythe

carried by the personification of death, used to cut life short. [Art.: Hall, 276]

skeleton

visual representation of death. [Western Folklore: Cirlot, 298]

skull

representation of body’s dissolution. [Christian Symbolism: Appleton, 92]

skull and crossbones

symbolizing mortality; sign on poison bottles. [World Culture: Brewer Dictionary, 1009]

Styx

river which must be crossed to enter Hades. [Gk. Myth.: Howe, 259]

Thanatos

(Mors) god of death; brother of Somnos (sleep). [Gk. Myth.: Gayley, 54]

Thoth

record-keeper of the dead. [Egyptian Myth.: Leach, 1109]

Valdemar, M.

in hypnotic trance, recounts impressions from other side of death. [Am. Lit.: “The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar” in Portable Poe, 268–280]

viaticum

Eucharist given to one who is dying. [Christianity: Brewer Dictionary, 1128]