Wilderness

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: Wil=der=ness

CIDE DICTIONARY

Wilderness, n. [OE. wildernesse, wilderne,probably from AS. wildor a wild beast; cf. D. wildernis wilderness. See Wilder, v. t.].

•  A tract of land, or a region, uncultivated and uninhabited by human beings, whether a forest or a wide, barren plain; a wild; a waste; a desert; a pathless waste of any kind.  [1913 Webster]

  "The wat'ry wilderness yields no supply."  [1913 Webster]
•  A disorderly or neglected place.  Cowper.  [1913 Webster]
•  Quality or state of being wild; wildness.  [1913 Webster]

  "These paths and bowers doubt not but our joint hands.
  Will keep from wilderness with ease."  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Wilderness, n.
1 a desert; an uncultivated and uninhabited region.
2 part of a garden left with an uncultivated appearance.
3 (foll. by of) a confused assemblage of things.

Idiom

in the wilderness out of political office. voice in the wilderness an unheeded advocate of reform (see Matt. 3:3 etc.).

Etymology

OE wildeornes f. wild deor wild deer

THESAURUS

Wilderness

Arabia Deserta, Chinese puzzle, Death Valley, Gordian knot, Lebensraum, Rube Goldberg contraption, Sahara, air space, back country, back of beyond, backcountry, backlands, backwoods, barren, barren land, barrens, boondock, boondocks, borderland, brush, bush, bush country, bushveld, can of worms, clear space, clearance, clearing, complex, desert, desolation, distant prospect, dust bowl, empty view, forests, frontier, glade, heath, hinterland, howling wilderness, jungle, karroo, knot, labyrinth, living space, lunar landscape, lunar waste, maze, meander, mesh, mess, open country, open space, outback, outpost, perplex, plain, prairie, ravel, salt flat, snafu, snake pit, snarl, steppe, tangle, tangled skein, terrain, territory, the bush, timbers, uninhabited region, up-country, virgin land, virgin territory, waste, wasteland, weary waste, webwork, wheels within wheels, wide-open spaces, wild, wild West, wildness, wilds, woodlands, woods

ROGET THESAURUS

Wilderness

Complexity

N complexity, complexness, complexus, complication, implication, intricacy, intrication, perplexity, network, labyrinth, wilderness, jungle, involution, raveling, entanglement, coil, sleave, tangled skein, knot, Gordian knot, wheels within wheels, kink, gnarl, knarl, webwork, difficulty, gnarled, knarled, complex, complexed, intricate, complicated, perplexed, involved, raveled, entangled, knotted, tangled, inextricable, irreducible.

Unproductiveness

N unproductiveness, infertility, sterility, infecundity, masturbation, impotence, unprofitableness, waste, desert, Sahara, wild, wilderness, howling wilderness, unproductive, acarpous, inoperative, barren, addled, infertile, unfertile, unprolific, arid, sterile, unfruitful, infecund, sine prole, fallow, teemless, issueless, fruitless, unprofitable, null and void, of no effect.

Space

N space, extension, extent, superficial extent, expanse, stretch, hyperspace, room, scope, range, field, way, expansion, compass, sweep, swing, spread, dimension, length, distance, size, volume, hypervolume, latitude, play, leeway, purchase, tolerance, room for maneuver, spare room, elbow room, house room, stowage, roomage, margin, opening, sphere, arena, open space, free space, void, waste, wildness, wilderness, moor, moorland, campagna, abyss, unlimited space, infinity, world, ubiquity, length and breadth of the land, proportions, acreage, acres, acres and perches, roods and perches, hectares, square miles, square inches, square yards, square centimeters, square meters, yards (clothing), ares, arpents, spacious, roomy, extensive, expansive, capacious, ample, widespread, vast, world-wide, uncircumscribed, boundless, shoreless, trackless, pathless, extended, extensively, wherever, everywhere, far and near, far and wide, right and left, all over, all the world over, throughout the world, throughout the length and breadth of the land, under the sun, in every quarter, in all quarters, in all lands, here there and everywhere, from pole to pole, from China to Peru, from Indus to the pole, from Dan to Beersheba, from end to end, on the face of the earth, in the wide world, from all points of the compass, to the four winds, to the uttermost parts of the earth.

Exclusion

N exclusion, nonadmission, omission, exception, rejection, repudiation, exile, noninclusion, preclusion, prohibition, separation, segregation, seposition, elimination, expulsion, cofferdam, excluding, exclusive, excluded, unrecounted, not included in, inadmissible, exclusive of, barring, except, with the exception of, save, bating, exclusion, seclusion, exclusion, seclusion, privacy, retirement, reclusion, recess, snugness, delitescence, rustication, rus in urbe, solitude, solitariness, isolation, loneliness, estrangement from the world, voluntary exile, aloofness, cell, hermitage, convent, sanctum sanctorum, depopulation, desertion, desolation, wilderness, howling wilderness, rotten borough, Old Sarum, exclusion, excommunication, banishment, exile, ostracism, proscription, cut, cut direct, dead cut, inhospitality, inhospitableness, dissociability, domesticity, Darby and Joan, recluse, hermit, eremite, cenobite, anchoret, anchorite, Simon Stylites, troglodyte, Timon of Athens, Santon, solitaire, ruralist, disciple of Zimmermann, closet cynic, Diogenes, outcast, Pariah, castaway, pilgarlic, wastrel, foundling, wilding, secluded, sequestered, retired, delitescent, private, bye, out of the world, out of the way, the world forgetting by the world forgot, snug, domestic, stay-at-home, unsociable, unsocial, dissocial, inhospitable, cynical, inconversable, unclubbable, sauvage, troglodytic, solitary, lonely, lonesome, isolated, single, estranged, unfrequented, uninhabitable, uninhabited, tenantless, abandoned, deserted, deserted in one's utmost need, unfriended, kithless, friendless, homeless, lorn, forlorn, desolate, unvisited, unintroduced, uninvited, unwelcome, under a cloud, left to shift for oneself, derelict, outcast, banished, noli me tangere, among them but not of them, and homeless near a thousand homes I stood, far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, makes a solitude and calls it peace, magna civitas magna solitudo, never less alone than when alone, O sacred solitude! divine retreat!.