wasteland

Etymology

It is formed from English waste + land.^[2][3][4][5] Etymonline and the Shorter Oxford take the first part as the adjective, the OED as the noun, and the OED adds that the compound can no longer be told apart from the phrase “waste land” with the adjective.^[4][3][2] The adjective is from Anglo-Norman waste, in Old French gaste, from Latin vastus (“empty, desolate”),^[4] and the noun goes back to land.^[4] Etymonline compares French terrain vague (“waste ground”), used in English by 1920.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Etymonline dates the word, written as one word, to 1825.^[4] The OED's first record is from New Zealand, in 1844, for land owned by the state,^[2][3] while Dictionary.com dates it to 1630–40 and Merriam-Webster to the 14th century, counting the phrase.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

The adjective waste was used of uncultivated, desolate land from about 1290.^[2][4] The figurative use, of a place or time thought spiritually or intellectually barren, is dated 1868 by Etymonline and 1869, in Trollope's Phineas Finn, by the OED;^[4][2] it often alludes to T. S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land (1922).^[2][4] The OED's literal senses follow: land in its natural, uncultivated state (1887, in W. Morris's Odyssey), unused land within built-up areas left to run wild (1922), and a waterless or treeless desert (1966, in F. Herbert's Dune).^[2]

Timeline

• 1825 – as one word.^[4]
• 1844 – in New Zealand, land in public ownership.^[2][3]
• 1869 – figurative, a spiritually or intellectually barren place or time.^[2] Etymonline dates this use to 1868.^[4]
• 1887 – land in its natural, uncultivated state.^[2]
• 1922 – unused land surrounded by developed land.^[2][3]
• 1966 – a desert.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. Barren or desolate land that is not cultivated or built on: Weeds and rubble covered the wasteland behind the station.^[7][6][2][3]
2. A place laid waste; a devastated area.^[6]
3. A waterless or treeless region; a desert.^[2][3]
4. A place, period or way of life seen as spiritually, intellectually or culturally barren.^[7][6][2][3]
5. (New Zealand) Land in public ownership.^[2][3]

Related words

• waste
• land

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins