Fabulous means wonderful, or belonging to legend. A fabulous party, fabulous wealth, fabulous beasts.
The everyday sense is enthusiastic and slightly camp; the older one is literal and means found in fables — fabulous beasts are the ones from stories. Fabulous wealth sits between the two, meaning wealth of a size found only in tales. Note fable, from the Latin for a story.
1adjectivewonderfulWonderful.
“You look fabulous in that dress!”
2adjectivefabulousBelonging to legend.
“Explorers searched the jungle for El Dorado, a fabulous city made of gold.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
fabulous is a quality of wonder.
Latin fabulosus means celebrated in fable, from fabula, a story, from fari, to speak. Fame and infant come from the same speaking.
Latin
fābulōsus
Middle English
fabulous
English, today
fabulous
From Middle English fabulous, from Latin fābulōsus. From Late Middle English fabulous, fabulose, from Latin fābulōsus (“celebrated in fable”); Equivalent to fable + ous.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA