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With a metropolitan area of more than 20 million people, Mexico City could be called the world's second or third most populous city. And the nearby Aztec city of Tenochtitlán was one of the largest cities in the world even when Hernán Cortés arrived there in 1519. But by the time Cortés conquered the city in 1521 it wasn't nearly so populous, since European diseases had greatly reduced the population. Avoid confusing populous and populace, which are pronounced exactly the same.

Examples of populous in a Sentence

the most populous state in the U.S.

Recent Examples on the Web India’s most populous state, are investigating a free vaccine camp held in a posh residential colony of Noida using jabs meant for a small town miles away. — Washington Post, 9 June 2021 Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state, also imposed only half-hearted restrictions during the second wave. — Shekhar Chandra, Scientific American, 9 June 2021 New South Wales, the country’s most populous state, where much of its livestock is farmed, suffered the worst—the highest temperatures, the longest stretches without rain. — Victoria Uren, The New Yorker, 9 June 2021 California, the most populous state in the nation and home to some of its most stringent gun laws, was also the site of the most active shooter incidents over the last two decades, according to a new FBI report. — Megan Cassidy, San Francisco Chronicle, 1 June 2021 Florida, the third-most populous state in the US and still growing, stands to lose more than its state marine mammal if manatees go extinct. — Scottie Andrew, CNN, 30 May 2021 The plague is a cruel blow to farmers in Australia’s most populous state who have been battered by fires, floods and pandemic disruptions in recent years, only to face the new scourge of the introduced house mouse, or Mus musculus. — Fox News, 29 May 2021 California, the most populous state in the union, saw its population decline in 2020 for the first time since 1850. — New York Times, 28 May 2021 The plague is a cruel blow to farmers in Australia’s most populous state who have been battered by fires, floods and pandemic disruptions in recent years, only to face the new scourge of the introduced house mouse, or Mus musculus. — Rod Mcguirk, Anchorage Daily News, 28 May 2021

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'populous.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.