| Among the few quincentenary projects to reach a satisfactory conclusion is a twelve-volume series called, somewhat portentously, the Repertorium Columbianum. |
| A German philosopher, for example, may transmit a superfluous toe or a prognathic jaw, but not his portentously developed brain. |
| Often hovering portentously around the edge of the drama, he pops up at irritatingly convenient moments to keep the plot going. |
| The small stuffed shop appeared to grow portentously cavernous and waveringly illumined. |
| A Halberstam paragraph usually filled a page, unfolding portentously towards some great quotation that glimmered in the final line. |
| And then all this gets underlined and italicized by a portentously romantic score. |
