Death drive is one of the most controversial concepts in psychoanalytical literature. According to Freud, the death drive has in essence a biological origin. We find such formulation to be problematic with regard to the determining qualities inherent to psychoanalytical theory, and in contradiction with the totality of the Freudien theory. This paper will be an attempt to set forth a different interpretation of the formulation of the death drive, with an emphasis on certain directions of Freud's conception of drive that have not been foregrounded in this context, and to reinterpret Freud's writings specifically in the context of the traumatic, and of the internalization and drive formation processes. It will be argued that in Freud's writings lies the potential to conceptualize the death drive not as originary but as historical; and that such conceptualization will potentially expand and be more consistent with the totality of Freud's theory.