the act of changing your location in a downward direction
"The hikers enjoyed their descent down the steep mountain trail at sunset."
the kinship relation between an individual and the individual's progenitors
"The king traced his royal descent back to a legendary ancestor from centuries ago."
a downward slope or bend
"The driver braked hard as the car approached the steep descent from the mountain pass."
An instance of descending; act of coming down.
"The descent from the mountain took us several hours to complete."
In plain English: Descent is when something goes down from a higher place to a lower one, like an elevator moving downward.
"The steep descent made the walk down the mountain very tiring."
Usage: Use descent to describe the physical action or process of moving downward, such as an elevator's journey from the top floor. Distinguish it from decline when referring to a gradual loss in quality or status rather than literal movement.
Descent entered English from the Middle French word descendre, meaning "to go down." The term traveled into our language alongside its related form, descente, keeping its original sense of moving downward or coming from a particular ancestor.