contract
CONTRACT scores 12 points in Scrabble and 62 as an eight-letter bingo, and its only one-letter neighbour is CONTRAST.
Noun 4 meanings
An agreement between two or more parties, to perform a specific job or work order, often temporary or of fixed duration and usually governed by a written agreement.
“sign a contract”
An agreement which the law will enforce in some way. A legally binding contract must contain at least one promise, i.e., a commitment or offer, by an offeror to and accepted by an offeree to do something in the future. A contract is thus executory rather than executed.
The document containing such an agreement.
A part of legal studies dealing with laws and jurisdiction related to contracts.
Verb 4 meanings
To draw together or nearer; to shorten, narrow, or lessen.
“The snail’s body contracted into its shell.”
To shorten by omitting a letter or letters or by reducing two or more vowels or syllables to one.
“The word “cannot” is often contracted into “can’t”.”
To make an agreement or contract; to covenant.
“The company contracted with the council to build 200 new houses.”
To enter into a contract with (someone or something).
“We have just contracted new pest control services.”
Etymology
From Middle English, from Old French contract, from Latin contractus (noun), from contrahere (“to bring together, to bring about, to conclude a bargain”) [from con- (“with, together”) + trahere (“to draw, to pull”)] + -tus (suffix forming nouns from verbs).
Similar and opposite words
A CONTRACT is an agreement between parties, often written and often fixed in length. The same spelling works as a verb, where it means to shrink or to catch. Rank 1,177 in the frequency list puts it among the busy eight-letter words, and two Cs make it playable.
CONTRACT at a glance
- Eight letters: C, O, N, T, R, A, C, T.
- Tiles add up to 12, since each of the two Cs brings 3.
- CONTRAST is the single neighbour; no anagrams are valid.
- It ranks 1,177 in frequency with a count of 25,746.
Why does CONTRACT sound different as a noun and a verb?
The noun puts stress on the first syllable, CON-tract, while the verb stresses the second, con-TRACT. The spelling stays identical, so a Scrabble board treats both the same.
That stress shift is a clue in speech but no help in a word game. Only the letter order matters when you build the play.
Crossword setters like the stress shift too, because one grid entry can carry two clues with unrelated senses. The verb sense adds shrinking and catching.
How does a CONTRACT bingo score?
C3, O1, N1, T1, R1, A1, C3 and T1 total 12. Playing all seven tiles from the rack plus one on the board earns the 50-point bonus, so the full play reaches 62.
Six of the eight letters are consonants, so a consonant-heavy rack suits it. Hold C, T, N and R with a pair of vowels and the word is close.
What else resembles CONTRACT?
CONTRAST changes the seventh letter from C to S and is the only neighbour. The -ACT tail rhymes in spelling with FACT, CONTACT, IMPACT and EXACT. Of 41,364 eight-letter words, 3,688 begin with C and 2,576 end in T, which makes both the opening and the closing letter of CONTRACT common choices for a pattern search.
Rhymes with contract
All rhymesOne letter away
Questions people ask
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