extravagant [LME] Extravagant came to us from medieval Latin extravagari, from extra- ‘outside’ and vagari ‘to wander’ (the source of vagabond and vagrant, see vague). It first meant ‘unusual, unsuitable’, and ‘diverging greatly’, then ‘excessive or elaborate’, not coming to mean ‘spending or costing a great deal’ until the early 18th century. An extravaganza [M18th] is an elaborate and spectacular entertainment or production. It is basically the same word as mid 17th-century extravagance, but came into English from Italian estravaganza in the 1750s, when it meant ‘extravagance in language or behaviour’.