navigate

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin nāvigātus (“sailed”), the past participle of nāvigō (“to sail, sail over, steer a ship”),^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} and Barnhart and Etymonline think it is also, or rather, a back-formation from navigation (1533).^[8][9] The Latin verb is formed from nāvis (“ship”) and the root of agō (“to drive, lead”),^{[2][10][3][9]} through a lost adjective *nāvigus (“driving a ship”).^[4][8] These come from Proto-Indo-European *nau- (“boat”) and Proto-Indo-European *ag- (“to drive”).^[9][10] The OED compares Middle French naviguer (late 14th century), Italian navigare (before 1321), Spanish navegar (1438) and Portuguese navegar (1405).^[2] Related words include navy, naval, navigable, navigator and agent.^[8][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

To travel by water in a ship, to sail; also, to steer a vessel: 1588, in R. Parke's translation of Mendoza's history of China.^[2][3][8]

Semantic evolution

The transitive sense "to sail on or across" (the sea, a river) is recorded from 1646, and "to steer or manage a vessel" from 1652.^[2][9] Johnson (1755) gave "to sail; to pass by water" and "to pass by ships or boats".^[11] The word was extended to balloons in 1784^[2][9] and to aircraft in 1901.^[9] In the United States it was used from 1843 for making one's way on foot,^[2] in slang for walking steadily;^[5] from 1869 for steering an animal or a vehicle, and then from 1884, in Huckleberry Finn, for crossing or getting past an obstacle.^[2] The sense of reading the map for a driver appears in Ian Fleming (before 1964), and the computing sense, moving around a file system or website, in 1975.^[2] Weekley notes that the noun navigator was applied in the 18th century to labourers digging canals for inland navigation, which gave navvy.^[12]

Timeline

• 1588 – to sail, to travel in a ship.^[2][3]
• 1646 – to sail on or across the sea, a river.^[2]
• 1652 – to steer or manage a vessel.^[2]
• 1784 – to direct a balloon.^[2][9]
• 1843 – to make one's way on foot (US).^[2]
• 1884 – to get past an obstacle, to negotiate.^[2]
• 1901 – of aircraft.^[9]
• before 1964 – to give directions to the driver of a car.^[2]
• 1975 – in computing, to move around a file system or website.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To plan and direct the route of a ship, aircraft or other vehicle.^[13][3][2]
2. To travel over, across or through water, air or land: Small boats navigated the canal.^[13][3][2]
3. To find one's way through or past something with care; to negotiate: He navigated the crowded market with a heavy bag.^[13][2][3]
4. Of a passenger, to give the driver directions and read the map.^[13][2]
5. (computing) To move from one part of a website, file or program to another.^[2]
6. (rare) To sail in a ship; to voyage.^[13][2]

Word family

• misnavigate
• renavigate
• unnavigated

Related words

• circumnavigate
• navigator
• navigable
• naval
• navy
• navigation
• nave
• navvy
• agent

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
13. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins