badlands

[ bad-landz ]
See synonyms for badlands on Thesaurus.com
plural noun
  1. a barren area in which soft rock strata are eroded into varied, fantastic forms.

Origin of badlands

1
An Americanism dating back to 1850–55; bad1 + land + -s3; translation of French mauvaises terres, alluding to the difficulty in traversing such country

Words Nearby badlands

Other definitions for Bad Lands (2 of 2)

Bad Lands

plural noun
  1. a barren, severely eroded region in SW South Dakota and NW Nebraska.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use badlands in a sentence

  • All have had to cross their badlands, ride roughshod above the timberline or grab for cover to avoid a ricochet.

    The Land of Look Behind | Paul Cameron Brown
  • Along a makeshift road into the badlands trucks brought crushed lime and phosphorus to supplement the ocean sediment.

    Monkey On His Back | Charles V. De Vet
  • All the raids along the east coast; everybody's blamed them on the badlands gangs.

    The Cosmic Computer | Henry Beam Piper
  • And a variegated mass in the distance marked the Rainbow Buttes, rising isolated and alone from out the badlands.

    The Yellow Horde | Hal G. Evarts
  • The least chipmunk is common in the buttes and associated badlands where it most frequently inhabits rocky areas.

British Dictionary definitions for badlands (1 of 2)

badlands

/ (ˈbædˌlændz) /


pl n
  1. any deeply eroded barren area

British Dictionary definitions for Bad Lands (2 of 2)

Bad Lands

pl n
  1. a deeply eroded barren region of SW South Dakota and NW Nebraska

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012