Preponderance

Alternative forms

• præponderance rare, archaic

Origin

From Latin praeponderare ("outweigh"), from prae- ("before") + ponderare ("to weigh")

Full definition of preponderance

Noun

1. Excess or superiority of weight, influence, or power, etc.; an outweighing.
• MacaulayIn a few weeks he had changed the relative position of all the states in Europe, and had restored the equilibrium which the preponderance of one power had destroyed.
• 2000, Paul Van Slambrouck, California''s brightest star is, well, gray, Subtle, institutional discrimination was evident in the preponderance of blacks and underprivileged whites fighting the war.
• 1900, Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams, Avon Books, (translated by James Strachey) pg. 168:But even less disgruntled observers have insisted that pain and un-pleasure are more common in dreams than pleasure: for instance, Scholz (1893, 57), Volkelt (1875, 80), and others. Indeed two ladies, Florence Hallam and Sarah Weed (1896, 499), have actually given statistical expression, based on a study of their own dreams, to the preponderance of unpleasure in dreaming.
2. (obsolete) The excess of weight of that part of a cannon behind the trunnions over that in front of them.
3. The greater portion of the weight.
• 2006, 1/24, Scott Baldauf , India history spat hits US, the preponderance of evidence shows that Aryans came to India, with their horses, their chariots, and their religious beliefs, from outside.
4. The majority.
• 1997, 8/17, Patricia Holt, Just Add Sand; Trash fiction for end-of-the summer beach reading, Is there a preponderance of female protagonists in commercial fiction, and if so, what does it mean?