thanatopsis means contemplation of death. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 88 out of 100.
thanatopsis is pronounced /θænəˈtɒpsɪs/.
Why “thanatopsis” is a great word
A philosophical meditation on or contemplation of the nature of death. From Ancient Greek θάνατος (thánatos, 'death') + ὄψις (ópsis, 'seeing, view'), the word was coined in 1816 by the American poet William Cullen Bryant as the title of his poem. Unlike an elegy, which is a lament for a specific loss, or a memento mori, a moral prompt to correct one's life, a thanatopsis is a calm, expansive viewing of mortality itself. It is the quiet beneath the yew tree’s shade, the slow dissolution of a cloud at dusk, and the patient understanding in the face of a granite headstone—a serene rehearsal for the great subtraction.
Etymology
From Ancient Greek θάνατος (thánatos, “death”) + ὄψις (ópsis, “seeing”), via the poem "Thanatopsis" by William Cullen Bryant. Although a surface analysis of thanato- + -opsis readily suggests itself and might invite a semantic expectation of deathliness, Bryant's sense of the word corresponds to "the seeing of death" rather than "the appearance/likeness of death".
noun
- Contemplation of death.