desolate

providing no shelter or sustenance

• “bare rocky hills”
• “barren lands”
• “the bleak treeless regions of the high Andes”
• “the desolate surface of the moon”
• “a stark landscape”

pitiable in circumstances especially through abandonment

• “desolate and despairing”
• “left forlorn”

crushed by grief

• “depressed and desolate of soul”
• “a low desolate wail”

made uninhabitable

• “upon this blasted heath” Shakespeare
• “a wasted landscape”

leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch

• “The mother deserted her children”

reduce in population

• “The epidemic depopulated the countryside”

devastate or ravage

• “The enemy lay waste to the countryside after the invasion”