Descent

Descent may refer to:

Genealogy and inheritance

 * Common descent, concept in evolutionary biology
 * Kinship, one of the major concepts of cultural anthropology
 * Pedigree chart or family tree
 * Ancestry
 * Lineal descendant
 * Heritage
 * Royal descent - lineal descent from a monarch
 * Phylogenetics
 * Tree diagram (disambiguation)
 * Inheritance (law and property)

Mathematics

 * Infinite descent, a method going back to Fermat to solve Diophantine equations
 * Descent (mathematics), an idea extending the notion of "gluing" in topology
 * Hadamard's method of descent, a technique for solving partial differential equations
 * Gradient descent, a first-order optimization algorithm going back to Newton
 * Descents in permutations, a classical permutation statistic in combinatorics

Other uses

 * Descent (aeronautics), the decrease of an aircraft in altitude during flight
 * Descent (font), the distance that a typeface descends below the baseline in typography
 * Katabasis

Film

 * The Descent, a 2005 horror film
 * The Descent Part 2, the 2009 sequel to the 2005 film
 * Descent (2007 film), a thriller film starring Rosario Dawson
 * Descent (2017 film), a Nigerian film

Gaming

 * Descent (video game), first in a series from Interplay Entertainment and Parallax Software
 * Descent II, sequel to Descent
 * Descent 3, sequel to Descent II
 * Descent: FreeSpace – The Great War, a 1998 space combat simulation computer game
 * Descent: Journeys in the Dark, a 2005 board game by Fantasy Flight Games
 * Dragon Age: Inquisition – The Descent, a 2015 downloadable content pack for Dragon Age: Inquisition

Literature

 * Descent: An Irresistible Tragicomedy of Everyday Life, a 2004 novel by Sabrina Broadbent
 * The Descent (novel), by Jeff Long
 * Descent (magazine), a magazine about caving
 * Descent (journal), a genealogy journal published by the Society of Australian Genealogists

Music

 * Descent, an album by the band This Burning Effigy
 * "Descent", a song by Celldweller from Soundtrack for the Voices in My Head Vol. 01
 * "Descent" (song), a song by Fear Factory from Obsolete
 * "Descent", a song by Godflesh from Us and Them
 * "Descent", a song by Knut from Bastardiser
 * "Descent", a song by Neurosis from Times of Grace
 * "Descent", a song by Sylosis from A Sign of Things to Come
 * "A Descent", a song by Born of Osiris from A Higher Place
 * "The Descent", a song by Insomnium from Shadows of the Dying Sun (bonus track)
 * "The Descent", a song by Polaris from The Death of Me

Television

 * "Descent" (Star Trek: The Next Generation), a two-part 1993 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation
 * "Descent" (The Outer Limits), a 1999 episode of The Outer Limits
 * "Descent" (Stargate SG-1), a 2002 episode of Stargate SG-1
 * "The Descent" (The Vampire Diaries), a 2011 episode of The Vampire Diaries
 * "Descent", a 2013 episode of NCIS: Los Angeles