breathe one's last

English edit

Perhaps first used in Shakespeare's Henry VI, part 3 (c. 1591). Compare breathe (“to live”).

breathe one's last (third-person singular simple present breathes one's last, present participle breathing one's last, simple past and past participle breathed one's last)

die
- c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
  Ah, Warwick! Montague hath breathed his last;
  And to the latest gasp cried out for Warwick,
- 1852 September 9, Thomas J. Plummer, “Obituary notices”, in The Millennial Harbinger, page 120:
  She breathed her last surrounded by her family and friends, commending them to God and the study of his word.
- 2022 October 16, Jenna Scherer, “An enticing House Of The Dragon crowns Westeros' new ruler”, in AV Club‎^[1]:
  The Green Council” is a tense chess game of an episode, kicking off the power vacuum that we knew was coming the moment Viserys breathed his last.
(uncommon) be defeated
- 2009, Ron Darling with Daniel Paisner, The Complete Game: Reflections on Baseball, Pitching, and Life on the Mound, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, →ISBN, page 236:
  For the longest while, the loss didn't seem real. For going on four hours, I'd done pretty much what I wanted to on that mound. I couldn't just shut that off, now that we had finally breathed our last.