waste

Less common meanings

8. 8
   killverbslangtransitive

   To kill or murder someone, especially deliberately and violently.

   He bragged that he'd waste the informant before sunrise.

   The hitman wasted his target and vanished before dawn.

   UsageSounds glib in reports and formal writing; there say kill or murder.

   Similarkill, murder, whack, ice

   Note

   A slang verb of killing that takes a person as its object, and its coldness is the point: a life is treated as something used up.

9. 9
   devastateverbtransitive

   To devastate or destroy something completely, especially to ravage land, towns, or settlements.

   The raiders wasted the coastal towns and carried off the harvest.

   A single campaign could waste an entire province within months.

   UsageToday the phrase lay waste to a place is more usual than the bare verb.

   Similardevastate, ravage, destroy, raze, sack

   Note

   The verb's harshest meaning is ruin done to land, and the destroyer need not be human. In Edmund Spenser's The Shepheardes Calender (1579), a shepherd addresses barren ground "whome winters wrath hath wasted". John Dryden's translation of Virgil (1697) has a hostile neighboring state that "wastes our fruitful grounds". Source

   Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 4 facts

   • The destroyer can be nonhuman. en.wikisource.org
   • Edmund Spenser wrote The Shepheardes Calender, first published in 1579. folger.edu
   • A shepherd addresses barren ground using the quoted words; the speaker is Colin Clout. en.wikisource.org
   • John Dryden's translation of Virgil was first published in 1697. openbook.lib.utah.edu
10. 10
    empty regionnouncountable

    A large, empty, desolate area of land or water, such as a desert, icy wilderness or open ocean.

    The explorers vanished somewhere in the polar waste.

    A cold wind swept across the trackless waste.

    UsageOften plural with of: the icy wastes of Antarctica.

    Similarwasteland, wilderness, desert

    Note

    Here the word stays closest to its root: the Frankish ancestor already meant "a waste", and behind it lies an Indo-European root meaning "empty". Edwin Williamson's Penguin History of Latin America (1992) speaks of "the chilly wastes of Patagonia". In the singular, Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped (1886) sends its travelers "down accordingly into the waste". Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 6 facts

    • The noun's reconstructed Frankish ancestor meant “a waste.” en.wiktionary.org
    • The noun ultimately derives from an Indo-European root meaning “empty.” en.wiktionary.org
    • Edwin Williamson wrote The Penguin History of Latin America, published in 1992. archive.org
    • Williamson's book contains the exact phrase “the chilly wastes of Patagonia.” en.wiktionary.org
    • Robert Louis Stevenson wrote Kidnapped, first published in 1886. en.wikisource.org
    • Kidnapped describes its travelers going “down accordingly into the waste”; David Balfour narrates the passage. gutenberg.org
11. 11
    unused (land)adjective

    Barren, desolate, and empty; left uncultivated or uninhabited.

    The pioneers claimed several acres of waste land along the ridge.

    A few sheep wandered across the waste moor.

    UsageUsually comes before a noun, especially in waste ground and waste land.

    Similarbarren, desolate, uncultivated, wild, empty

    Oppositefertile, cultivated, productive

    Note

    Used of wild, uninhabited land in general, the adjective now mostly survives in the barren sense. Tennyson's In Memoriam (1850) still has "From out waste places comes a cry". Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

    • Tennyson wrote In Memoriam, first published in 1850. en.wikisource.org
    • In Memoriam contains the quoted line. rpo.library.utoronto.ca
12. 12
    worthlessadjectiveslang

    Useless, rubbish, or disappointing.

    The whole event was waste, a complete letdown from start to finish.

    He talked big all week, then didn't even show up. He's so waste.

    UsageUsually after a verb and often with so: he's so waste.

    Similarrubbish, lame, useless, pathetic

    Note

    A put-down from Multicultural Toronto English, aimed at people and their behavior. Drake's "Free Smoke" (2017) uses it of other people's moves, and Bert Le Plug's "Ontario Place" (2022) aims it straight at the listener as a snap.

13. 13
    ruined areanouncountable

    Destruction caused by war or disaster, or an area left in ruins by it.

    Survivors picked their way through the bombed-out waste of the old quarter.

    The eruption turned a thriving valley into a lifeless waste.

    Similarwasteland, ruin, devastation

14. 14
    untapped wealthnounusually singular

    A large abundance of something that goes unused; a wealth or expanse left untapped.

    Similarexpanse

15. 15
    common landnounhistoricaluncountable

    On a manor, the open, uncultivated land outside the farmed fields, over which tenants often held rights such as grazing animals or cutting turf.

    Commoners had ancient rights to cut turf from the manorial waste.

    Much of the parish was once waste, open to all the tenants.

    Similarcommon

    Note

    A historian's term rather than a description of scenery. Manorial waste was a category of land use: the unenclosed, uncultivated ground on a manor, of any size, outside the tilled fields. Tenants often held customary rights over it, such as grazing animals or taking turf, and those rights explain why much of it is now treated as common. Source

    Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

    • Manorial waste was a category of land within a manor. foundationforcommonland.org.uk
    • The term did not specify the size of the land. en.wiktionary.org
16. 16
    adjective

    Gloomy and cheerless in mood or appearance.
17. 17
    noun

    In property law, a legal claim brought against the current holder of land for damaging it, harming the interest of someone who will own it in the future.
18. 18
    verb

    To damage or impair an estate one holds, either deliberately or by letting its buildings and fences fall into decay.
19. 19
    noun

    Eroded rock and soil material carried from the land by streams down to the sea.
20. 20
    noun

    A worked-out or abandoned section of a mine.