Which Greek god is the personification of death and twin of Hypnos? Thanatos is the Greek personification of death and the twin brother of Hypnos, the personification of sleep.
Hesiod describes Thanatos as a son of Nyx, the goddess of Night. His name literally means “death,” and he belongs to a family of abstract powers that includes figures such as Doom, Old Age, Strife, and Suffering. Thanatos was usually a minor divine figure rather than a ruler of the underworld.
Thanatos is often shown with wings, a sword, an inverted torch, a butterfly, or poppies. These symbols express a life extinguished, the soul, or the close relationship between sleep and death. In Homer’s Iliad, Thanatos and Hypnos carry the body of the fallen hero Sarpedon to his homeland for burial.
A common mix-up is choosing Hades, who rules the underworld, or Cerberus, who guards its entrance. Thanatos represents death itself. Greek tradition also distinguished peaceful death, associated with Thanatos, from violent death, sometimes represented by the Keres.