Grim Reaper

Meaning

A personification of Death as an old man, or a skeleton, carrying a scythe, taking souls to the afterlife.

Synonyms

Reaper

devil

fiend

demon

imp

👿

retriever

ghost

👻

Translations

Faucheuse

Sensenmann

Morte

💀

Muerte

Parca

Mort

Schnitter

Père Ankou

démon

Dämon

diable

diable

cháros

Thanatos

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈɡɹɪm ˈɹiː.pə/

Etymology

Cognate with Old English: grima

Cognate with English: grim

In summary

From grim + reaper, first attested 1847. The word grim previously had a stronger meaning ("fierce, angry, sinister") and had more of an association with ghostliness (compare Old English grima (“specter, apparition”), English grim (n.)). The association between grim and death dates back to at least the late 16th century (the line "grim death, how foul and loathsome is thine image" appears in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew around 1590). The reaper element comes from the personification of Death as a reaper (harvester) of souls in connection to the popular depiction of Death wielding a scythe. The symbol of the scythe itself comes from a partially unintentional conflation of Cronus (the Titan associated with the harvest, said to have used his scythe to castrate his father Uranus) and Chronos (the personification of Father Time).