Meaning

verb travel on water propelled by wind or by other means

verb act as the navigator in a car, plane, or vessel and plan, direct, plot the path and position of the conveyance

verb direct carefully and safely

originFirst attested in 1588; borrowed from Latin nāvigātus, the perfect passive participle of nāvigō (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from nāvis (“ship”) + -igō, from Proto-Indo-European *néh₂us (“boat”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0