a wild and uncultivated region, as of forest or desert, uninhabited or inhabited only by wild animals; a tract of wasteland.
a tract of land officially designated as such and protected by the U.S. government.
any desolate tract, as of open sea.
a part of a garden set apart for plants growing with unchecked luxuriance.
a bewildering mass or collection.
a wild, uninhabited, and uncultivated region
any desolate tract or area
a confused mass or collection
a person, group, etc, making a suggestion or plea that is ignored
no longer having influence, recognition, or publicity
See desert 1.
1150–1200; Middle English; Old English *wil ( d ) dēornes, equivalent to either wil ( d ) dēor wild beast ( see wild, deer) + -nes -ness, or wilddēoren wild, savage ( wilddēor + -en -en 2 ) + ( -n ) es -ness; probably reinforced by Middle English wildernes, genitive of wildern wilderness (noun use of Old English wilddēoren ), in phrases like wildernes land land of wilderness
If you don’t mow your lawn all summer, don’t be surprised if your neighbors complain that it resembles a wilderness, a wild area that is not tended by humans. The wilderness is of course filled with many animals, but did you know that the name of an animal is hidden in the word wilderness? The word actually is a combination of wild plus the Old English word dēor, along with the ending -ness, used in nouns that refer to a certain condition. While dēor eventually turned into our modern word deer, it didn’t refer to the antlered Bambi we imagine. It was simply the word for “animal.”
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So having been left out of the past four squads, why has Tuchel decided to bring the forward back in from the international wilderness?
From BBC • May 22, 2026
Ivan Toney, who has spent almost a year in the international wilderness and now plays his club football in Saudi Arabia, has also not given up hope of making the squad.
From BBC • May 21, 2026
It would also require a rare act of “un-designating” some of the park’s protected wilderness areas.
From Los Angeles Times • May 17, 2026
“Tracker” is primarily set in the wilderness, making the move to California a fresh opportunity for the production to explore diverse landscapes for its backdrop.
From Los Angeles Times • May 5, 2026
Two hundred and thirty miles of wilderness had been burned, ripped apart, or buried under a hundred feet of mud and debris.
From "I Survived the Eruption of Mount St. Helens, 1980" by Lauren Tarshis
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
