Annulment definition (noun)

1. An annulment is a court order stating that a marriage is invalid and effectively terminated. Legally, it means the marriage never happened in the first place. 

   An annulment can be declared for a number of reasons, including fraud or the existence of a prior marriage. A judge may rule that a marriage was never valid because one party was underage or of unsound mind when they married. The grounds for annulment are not limited to only those marriages that were contracted during an earlier marriage.