# proportion
## English
### Etymology

From Middle English proporcion, from Old French proportion, from Latin prōportiō (“comparative relation, proportion, symmetry, analogy”), from pro (“for, before”) + portio (“share, part”); see portion.

### Pronunciation

* (General American) IPA: /pɹəˈpɔɹʃən/
* (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /pɹəˈpɔːʃən/
* (rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger) IPA: /pɹəˈpo(ː)ɹʃən/
* (non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger) IPA: /pɹəˈpoəʃən/
* Audio (US):(file)
* Rhymes: -ɔː(ɹ)ʃən
* Hyphenation: pro‧por‧tion

### Noun

proportion (countable and uncountable, plural proportions)
* (countable) A quantity of something that is part of the whole amount or number.
** 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter VI, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:“I don't mean all of your friends—only a small proportion—which, however, connects your circle with that deadly, idle, brainless bunch—the insolent chatterers at the opera, the gorged dowagers, the worn-out, passionless men, the enervated matrons of the summer capital, […]!”
* (uncountable) Harmonious relation of parts to each other or to the whole.
* (countable) Proper or equal share.
** 1651, Jer[emy] Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living. […], 2nd edition, London: […] Francis Ashe […], →OCLC:Let the women […] do the same things in their proportions and capacities.
* The relation of one part to another or to the whole with respect to magnitude, quantity, or degree.
    the proportion of the parts of a building, or of the body
** 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC:The image of Christ made in Pilate's time after his own proportion.
** 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC:Formed in the best proportions of her sex.
* (mathematics, countable) A statement of equality between two ratios.
* (mathematics, archaic) The "rule of three", in which three terms are given to find a fourth.
* (countable, chiefly in the plural) Size.
** 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:The humor of my proposition appealed more strongly to Miss Trevor than I had looked for, and from that time forward she became her old self again; […] . Now she had come to look upon the matter in its true proportions, and her anticipation of a possible chance of teaching him a lesson was a pleasure to behold.
** 2012 May 20, Nathan Rabin, “TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “Marge Gets A Job” (season 4, episode 7; originally aired 11/05/1992)”, in The Onion AV Club:What other television show would feature a gorgeously designed sequence where a horrifically mutated Pierre and Marie Curie, their bodies swollen to Godzilla-like proportions from prolonged exposure to the radiation that would eventually kill them, destroy an Asian city with their bare hands like vengeance-crazed monster-Gods?

#### Derived terms

* blow out of proportion
* blow out of proportions
* compound proportion
* disproportionate
* divine proportion
* harmonic proportion
* in proportion
* inverse proportion
* of Koranic proportions
* out of all proportion
* out of proportion
* proportional
* proportionally
* proportionate
* proportioner
* reciprocal proportion

#### Translations
### Verb

proportion (third-person singular simple present proportions, present participle proportioning, simple past and past participle proportioned)
* (transitive) To divide into proper shares; to apportion.
** 1960 April, “The braking of trains”, in Trains Illustrated, page 237:In order to proportion the braking force to the weight carried by a wheel - a matter of special importance in the braking of wagons - variable leverage systems are now being introduced in which the end of one axle spring is linked to a control spring in the change-over valve, so automatically varying the leverage exerted by the brake-rod according to whether the wagon is full or empty.
* (transitive) To form symmetrically.
* (transitive, art) To set or render in proportion.
* (transitive, archaic) To correspond to.

#### Translations
### Further reading

* “proportion”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
* William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “proportion”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

## Danish
### Etymology

Via French proportion, from Latin proportio.

### Noun

proportion c (singular definite proportionen, plural indefinite proportioner)
* proportion

#### Declension
### References

* “proportion” in Den Danske Ordbog

## French
### Etymology

Inherited from Old French proportion, borrowed from Latin prōportiōnem.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /pʁɔ.pɔʁ.sjɔ̃/
* Audio:(file)

### Noun

proportion f (plural proportions)
* proportion

#### Derived terms

* toutes proportions gardées

### References

* “proportion”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

## Swedish
### Noun

proportion c
* proportion

#### See also

* andel

### References

* proportion in Svensk ordbok (SO)
* proportion in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
* proportion in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)