preponderance

• præponderance (rare, archaic)

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

preponderance (countable and uncountable, plural preponderances)

1. Excess or superiority of weight, influence, or power, etc.; an outweighing.
   • Macaulay

     In 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 April 17, Paul Van Slambrouck, “California''s brightest star is, well, gray”, in Christian Science Monitor:

     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 January 24, Scott Baldauf, “India history spat hits US”, in Christian Science Monitor:

     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 August 17, Patricia Holt, “Just Add Sand; Trash fiction for end-of-the summer beach reading”, in San Francisco Chronicle, page 1:

     Is there a preponderance of female protagonists in commercial fiction, and if so, what does it mean?

• preponderance in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• preponderance in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.