Definition of "superfluity"
superfluity
noun
countable and uncountable, plural superfluities
Something superfluous, as a luxury.
Quotations
As they had almost all the conveniencies of life within themselves, they seldom visited towns or cities in search of superfluity.
1766, [Oliver Goldsmith], chapter 4, in The Vicar of Wakefield: […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), Salisbury, Wiltshire: […] B. Collins, for F[rancis] Newbery, […]; reprinted London: Elliot Stock, 1885,
I really doubt whether there be such a thing as a heart in the world: perhaps, after all, it is only an elegant superfluity kept for the use of poets. Certainly we have no use for it here.
1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Lady Marchmont to Sir Jasper Meredith. Courtiers.”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], page 256
It is to be presumed that Miss Blanche Amory had more than one rose in her bouquet, and why should not the kind young creature give out of her superfluity, and make as many partners as possible happy?
1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 46, in The History of Pendennis. […], volumes (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850
(rare) Collective noun for a group of nuns.
Quotations
These probably mark the dwelling of a colony, or to speak more precisely, according to Dame Juliana Berners, a superfluity of nuns from Godstow, which nunnery had a cell there, and was patron of the living.
1905, Herbert A. Evans, Highways and Byways in Oxford and the Cotswolds, Macmillan and Co, page 266