Some have asked: Should there be artifacts or remains that the Book of Mormon people left behind when they were swept off the land? Our response is: Yes, but only artifacts or remains of items actually mentioned in the Book of Mormon account and that could have survived to the present day, such as cast up highways. We should not be expected to find the types of buildings or other structures that the Nephites did not construct (see our topic article, Searching for Book of Mormon Ruins: What should we expect to find?). The remains or artifacts of the Nephite structures may not still exist because of their perishable nature, or, more importantly, these structures were left “desolate” in keeping with the prophecies of the Lord to the Nephites and to the people of Jerusalem, that if they did not repent and return unto him with full purpose of heart, “the places of [their] dwellings shall become desolate until the time of the fulfilling of the covenant to [their] fathers” (3 Ne. 10:6–7):

The actual deed—the “desolation of their dwelling places”—is an often-overlooked step within the total disintegration process of the Lamanite and Nephite civilizations. Isaiah also predicted this desolated condition would be inflicted upon those of the house of Israel:

The concept of rendering a place “desolate” should be clearly defined and understood. A “desolated” place by definition is one that is caused to be “deserted of people” and “made empty or bare” by the devastation and obliteration of buildings, crops, trees and everything of substance, rendering the land “without sign of life” and “unfit for habitation.” The Book of Mormon record is clear that the Nephites and the Lamanites in the end did not repent and return to the Lord, and the prophesied desolation was fulfilled. Likewise, the people of the Biblical land of Jerusalem, because of wickedness, witnessed the equivalent “abomination of desolation” of their homes and towns by the Romans under Titus, including the temple they thought would not be destroyed (Deut. 28:52; Matt. 24:2; Mark 13:1–2; Luke 19:40–44; 21:20; D&C 45:18–21; JST–Matthew 2–21). According to the Lord, this “desolation” and the resulting devastation and abandonment of Jewish and Nephite places and dwellings would continue until “the fulfilling of the covenant to [their] fathers,” which began with the restoration of the gospel in 1830 (3 Ne. 10:7; see also, D&C 66:2).

It is the destruction and “sweeping off” of people and their possessions by decree of the Lord and the ruination and obliteration of structures that render a land “desolate.” A desolated land is not the same as a deserted land. A deserted land is abandoned but not devastated nor left desolate and obliterated. And a desolate land is not a barren land that was never productive. A desolate land, unlike a barren land, can be resettled and reclaimed to its former productive state when the Lord so directs, for example, the once “desolated,” but now productive agricultural areas of the Holy Land. Because the Book of Mormon people built humble structures of wood and cement (adobe), all of which would have easily been destroyed by natural disasters, leaving little or no evidence of their civilization, the question then becomes: What should we expect to find after the Lord has allowed the Lamanites and Nephities to be swept off the land, their civilizations destroyed and the land cursed?

The previously inhabited Jaredite land in the “land northward” was “called Desolation by the Nephites,” even though the land itself, its soil and its potential to grow vegetation and crops, was not “desolate, save it were for timber; but because of the greatness of the destruction of the people who had before inhabited the land it was called desolate” (Ether 7:6; Hel. 3:6; see also, Morm. 3:5; Morm. 4:2). This empty land of Desolation, before it was reclaimed and restored by the Nephites, was “rendered desolate and without timber, because of the many inhabitants who had before inherited the land” (Hel. 3:5). Like the Nephite and Lamanite lands, this Jaredite land, in fulfillment of the prophecies of the Lord, was swept of people and made empty or bare by the devastation and obliteration of buildings, crops, trees and everything of substance, rendering the land without sign of life and for a period of time unfit for habitation. The Lord “had sworn in his wrath unto the brother of Jared, that whoso should possess this land of promise, from that time henceforth and forever, should serve him, the true and only God, or they should be swept off when the fulness of his wrath should come upon them” (Ether 2:8). In 121 B.C., king Limhi secretly sent a “small number of men” northwards, “to search for the land of Zarahemla,” and to obtain help for freeing his people from bondage. The search party was “lost in the wilderness for the space of many days, yet they were diligent, and found not the land of Zarahemla” but “discovered a land [the land Desolation] which was covered with bones of men, and of beasts, and was also covered with ruins of buildings of every kind, having discovered a land which had been peopled with a people [the Jaredites] who were as numerous as the hosts of Israel” (Mosiah 8:7–11). The Nephites and Lamanites refrained from settling this desolated northern land of the Jaredites until 55 B.C., for reasons that are not clear from the record—they may have been delayed by the Lord’s timetable, or possibly resettlement needed to wait until the land naturally recovered and became reforested to an advanced stage (see section on Cement, in our topic article, Searching for Book of Mormon Ruins: What should we expect to find? and also, “Arriving in the Promised Land” in our topic article, Jared, his Brother and their Friends: A Geographical Analysis of the Book of Ether).