Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Devoid of inhabitants; deserted.
  • adjective Barren; lifeless.
  • adjective Feeling, showing, causing, or expressing sadness or loneliness. synonym: sad.
  • transitive verb To rid or deprive of inhabitants.
  • transitive verb To lay waste; devastate.
  • transitive verb To forsake; abandon.
  • transitive verb To make lonely, forlorn, or wretched.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To render lonely, as a place or region, by depopulation or devastation; make desert; lay waste; ruin; ravage.
  • To overwhelm with grief; afflict; make very sorry or weary: as, his heart was desolated by his loss; your misfortune desolates me; to be desolated by ennui.
  • Solitary; lonely; without companionship; forsaken.
  • Overwhelmed with grief; deprived of comfort; afflicted.
  • Destitute; lacking.
  • Destitute of inhabitants; uninhabited; lonely; abandoned: as, a desolate wilderness; desolate altars; desolate towers.
  • Lost to shame; abandoned; dissolute.
  • Synonyms Companionless.
  • Forlorn, cheerless, miserable, wretched.
  • Abandoned, unfrequented, lonely, waste, wild, barren, dreary.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Destitute or deprived of inhabitants; deserted; uninhabited; hence, gloomy
  • adjective Laid waste; in a ruinous condition; neglected; destroyed.
  • adjective Left alone; forsaken; lonely; comfortless.
  • adjective obsolete Lost to shame; dissolute.
  • adjective obsolete Destitute of; lacking in.
  • transitive verb To make desolate; to leave alone; to deprive of inhabitants.
  • transitive verb To lay waste; to ruin; to ravage.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Deserted and devoid of inhabitants.
  • adjective Barren and lifeless.
  • adjective Made unfit for habitation or use.
  • adjective Dismal or dreary.
  • adjective Sad, forlorn and hopeless.
  • verb To deprive of inhabitants.
  • verb To devastate or lay waste somewhere.
  • verb To abandon or forsake something.
  • verb To make someone sad, forlorn and hopeless.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch
  • verb reduce in population
  • adjective providing no shelter or sustenance
  • adjective crushed by grief
  • verb cause extensive destruction or ruin utterly

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English desolat, from Latin dēsōlātus, past participle of dēsōlāre, to abandon : dē-, de- + sōlus, alone; see s(w)e- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English, from Latin desolatus, past participle of desolare ("to leave alone, make lonely, lay waste, desolate"), from solus ("alone").

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