(a) Wild, uninhabited, or uncultivated territory; trackless, desolate land; a tract or region of wild or uninhabited land; a desert; also fig.; (b) in names of specific places: ~ of inde; ~ of the jeuerie, the wilderness of Judea; ~ of wirale, the forest of Wirral; se of ~, the Dead Sea; (c) a devastated or depopulated place, a ruined city, a ruin; pl. ruins; (d) a state of ruin or desolation, the condition of devastation; (e) fig. human life and experience; the secular world.