endling means The last individual of its species or subspecies, which therefore becomes extinct upon its death. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 89 out of 100.
Why this word is great
ENDLING — [Noun] The last known individual of a species or subspecies, whose death marks the extinction of that taxon. From end ("termination") + -ling (diminutive suffix denoting association), coined in 1996 in the journal Nature. Unlike "extinct" (which describes the hollow aftermath) or "holotype" (a specimen pinned to taxonomy’s ledger), "endling" is the living elegy—the solitary bell toll before silence. It is Martha the passenger pigeon blinking in her Cincinnati cage, Lonesome George’s heavy shell on the Galápagos sand, the final thylacine pacing its concrete zoo cell under indifferent fluorescent lights—a word that turns absence into a face, and extinction into a funeral we failed to attend.
noun
- The last individual of its species or subspecies, which therefore becomes extinct upon its death.“The last known survivor, the endling of its species, is now stuffed and mounted in a museum in the remote, dusty city of Nukus.”