Descent may refer to:

As a noun

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 (disambiguation), 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#Descents, 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

As a proper name

Film

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

Gaming

* Descent (video game), ''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), ''The Descent'' (novel), by Jeff Long * Descent (magazine), ''Descent'' (magazine), a magazine about caving * Descent (journal), ''Descent'' (journal), a genealogy journal published by the Society of Australian Genealogists

Music

* ''Descent'', an album by the band This Burning Effigy * Descent (song), "Descent" (song), a song by Fear Factory from ''Obsolete'' * "Descent", a song by Godflesh from ''Us and Them (Godflesh album), Us and Them'' * "Descent", a song by Knut from ''Bastardiser'' * "Descent", a song by Neurosis from ''Times of Grace (album), Times of Grace'' * "A Descent", a song by Born of Osiris from ''A Higher Place'' * "The Descent", a song by Polaris from ''The Death of Me (Polaris album), The Death of Me''

Television

* Descent (Star Trek: The Next Generation), "Descent" (''Star Trek: The Next Generation''), a two-part 1993 episode of ''Star Trek: The Next Generation'' * Descent (The Outer Limits), "Descent" (''The Outer Limits''), a 1999 episode of ''The Outer Limits'' * Descent (Stargate SG-1), "Descent" (''Stargate SG-1''), a 2002 episode of ''Stargate SG-1'' * The Descent (The Vampire Diaries), "The Descent" (''The Vampire Diaries''), a 2011 episode of ''The Vampire Diaries'' * "Descent", a 2013 episode of ''NCIS: Los Angeles (season 4), NCIS: Los Angeles''