vagabond
Americanadjective
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wandering from place to place without any settled home; nomadic.
a vagabond tribe.
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leading an unsettled or carefree life.
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disreputable; worthless; shiftless.
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of, relating to, or characteristic of a vagabond.
vagabond habits.
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having an uncertain or irregular course or direction.
a vagabond voyage.
noun
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a person with no fixed home
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an idle wandering beggar or thief
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(modifier) of or like a vagabond; shiftless or idle
Synonym Usage
See vagrant.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of vagabond
First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English vagabound (from Old French vagabond ), from Late Latin vagābundus “wandering, vagrant,” equivalent to Latin vagā(rī) “to wander” + -bundus adjective suffix
Explanation
A vagabond is someone who moves around a lot. Picture Boxcar Willie, bandana on a stick thrown over his shoulder, going wherever the breeze takes him. Vagabond can also be an adjective, a nomadic tribe is a vagabond one, or the person who moved eight times in two years is living a vagabond life. It's from the Latin word vagabundus (from vagari, "wander") which means "inclined to wander." So — if you were born a ramblin' man, you might just be a vagabond.
Vocabulary lists containing vagabond
"The Odyssey" by Homer, Books 14–18
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Bless Me, Ultima
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Tolkien Reading Day, List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Its stone fireplace comes to rest on what appear to be colossal boulders deposited by the last vagabond glacier.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026
A friend unexpectedly hosted a vagabond queen who birthed a litter in their place.
From Salon ● Dec. 6, 2024
Briones, then a student of Ruizpalacios’ acting courses, had a much smaller role as the immigrant restaurant owner demanding his missing funds, and later as a vagabond who wanders into the kitchen.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 31, 2024
He spent the next 16 years essentially as an NHL vagabond, piling up points but unable to find a place where he could reproduce the postseason magic that defined his early days in Pittsburgh.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 15, 2024
No one understood why, for no one knew his history, other than that he was a vagabond Kenyon had adopted years ago.
From "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote
Then we would have student-athletes instead of shopping vagabonds.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 10, 2025
Although the pizza-pilfering vagabonds — and a variety of other creatures — thrive in cities, for many wild animals urban environments are unappealing homes, covered in concrete and carved up by car traffic.
From New York Times ● Sep. 4, 2023
Obsessed with the search for home, he made music, whether with The Band or as a solo artist, that improvised a map for vagabonds without a precise set of directions.
From Salon ● Aug. 12, 2023
He said they were a "band of vagabonds" who were trying to escape from conventional regimental discipline.
From BBC ● Nov. 26, 2022
Come November, as the weather turns cold across the rest of the country, some five thousand snowbirds and drifters and sundry vagabonds congregate in this otherworldly setting to live on the cheap under the sun.
From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
