death vs downfall

death

noun
  • The collapse or end of something. 

  • The cessation of life and all associated processes; the end of an organism's existence as an entity independent from its environment and its return to an inert, nonliving state. 

  • Spiritual lifelessness. 

  • The personification of death as a hooded figure with a scythe; the Grim Reaper. The pronoun he is not the only option, but probably the most traditional one, as it matches with the male grammatical gender of Old English dēaþ, also with cognate German der Tod. The fourth apocalyptic rider (Bible, revelations 6:8) is male θᾰ́νᾰτος (thanatos) in Greek. It has the female name Mors in Latin, but is referred to with male forms qui and eum. The following quotes show this rider on a pale horse is his in the English Bible and she in Peter Gabriel's lyrics. 

  • A cause of great stress, exhaustion, embarrassment, or another negative condition (for someone). 

  • Execution (in the judicial sense). 

downfall

noun
  • An act of falling down. 

  • The cause of such a fall; a critical blow or error. 

  • A precipitous decline in fortune; death or rapid deterioration, as in status or wealth. 

verb
  • To fall down; deteriorate; decline. 

How often have the words death and downfall occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )