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To make briefer; to shorten; to abridge; to reduce by contraction or omission, especially of words written or spoken. It is one thing to abbreviate by contracting, another by cutting off. Bacon.

The form to which a word or phrase is reduced by contraction and omission; a letter or letters, standing for a word or phrase of which they are a part; as, Gen. for Genesis; U.S.A. for United States of America.

To shorten or contract by using fewer words, yet retaining the sense; to epitomize; to condense; as, to abridge a history or dictionary.

of that of friendship or intimacy; as, I know the man; but have no acquaintance with him. Contract no friendship, or even acquaintance, with a guileful man. Sir W. Jones.

due, or in aid of an enterprise; to supply beforehand; as, a merchant advances money on a contract or on goods consigned to him.

Plighted faith; marriage contract or promise.

One who makes a contract of marriage between two persons.

The act of hiring, or the contract for the use of, a vessel, or some part of it, to convey cargo.

or omitted; an exchange of promises; mutual understanding, arrangement, or stipulation; a contract.

A contraction for are not and am not; also used for is not. [Colloq. or llliterate speech]. See An't.

Depending on some uncertain contingency; as, an aleatory contract. Bouvier.

A contraction of amperometer or ampèremeter.

Any stock of missiles, literal or figurative. Ammunition bread, shoes, etc., such as are contracted for by government, and supplied to the soldiers. [Eng.]

Not contracted of brief; not concise; extended; diffusive; as, an ample narrative. Johnson.

A contraction for are and am not; also used for is not; -- now usually written ain't. [Colloq. & illiterate speech.]

Of each; an equal quantity; as, wine and honey, ana (or, contracted, aa), ., that is, of wine and honey, each, two ounces. An apothecary with a . . . long bill of anas. Dryden.

eath. Angina pectoris, a peculiarly painful disease, so named from a sense of suffocating contraction or tightening of the lower part of the chest; -- called also breast pang, spasm of the chest.

The first of the two propositions which constitute an enthymeme or contracted syllogism; as, Every man is mortal; therefore the king must die.

The contraction of a word by the omission of a letter or letters, which omission is marked by the character ['] placed where the letter or letters would have been; as, call'd for called.

To contract by omitting a letter or letters; also, to mark with an apostrophe (') or apostrophes.