At one time, if something was "inordinate," it did not conform to the expected or desired order of things. That sense, synonymous with disorderly or unregulated , is now archaic, but it offers a hint as to the origins of inordinate. The word traces back to the Latin verb ordinare, meaning "to arrange," combined with the negative prefix in- . Ordinare is also the ancestor of such English words as coordination , ordain , ordination , and subordinate . The Latin root is a derivative of the noun ordo, meaning "order" or "arrangement," from which the English order and its derivatives originate.

Examples

"The goalie in hockey, like a quarterback in football, has an inordinate amount of influence on a game." — Dave Hyde, The South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 31 July 2020

"… we had arrived with our first-ever outdoor grill. However, it was not yet an assembled first-ever outdoor grill. The uncles, assigned to grill duty, gathered in serious conference to study an array of parts. They were intent on putting these parts together, a task that will take them an inordinate amount of time. They were not practiced in construction." — Ruth Charney, The Recorder (Greenfield, Massachusetts), 27 Aug. 2020