contract.とは

意味・読み方・使い方

発音

• enPR: kŏn'trăkt
• (Received 発音) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒntɹækt/
• (米国用法) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑntɹækt/

名詞

contract (複数形 contracts)

1. 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.

   Marriage is a contract.

   • 2013 August 10, Lexington, “Keeping the mighty honest”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:

     British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.

2. (law) 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.
3. (law) A part of legal studies dealing with laws and jurisdiction related to contracts.
4. (informal) An order, usually given to a hired assassin, to kill someone.

   The mafia boss put a contract out on the man who betrayed him.

5. (bridge) The declarer's undertaking to win the number of tricks bid with a stated suit as trump.

同意語

• (part of legal studies): contract law

上位語

• (agreement that is legally binding): agreement

下位語

• (agreement that is legally binding): bailment

派生語

• contract of employment
• contractual
• fixed-term contract

形容詞

contract (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Contracted; affianced; betrothed.
   • 1609, William Shakespeare, Sonnet 1:

     But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, feed'st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel

2. (obsolete) Not abstract; concrete.
   • 1557, Robert Recorde, The Whetſtone of Witte:

     But now in eche kinde of these, there are certaine nombers named Abſtracte: and other called nombers Contracte.

語源 2

From Middle English, from Middle French contracter, from Latin contractum, past participle of contrahere (“to bring together, to bring about, to conclude a bargain”), from con- (“with, together”) + trahere (“to draw, to pull”). The verb developed after the noun, and originally meant only "draw together"; the sense "make a contract with" developed later.

発音

• enPR: kəntrăkt, IPA^(key): /kənˈtɹækt/

動詞

contract (三人称単数 現在形 contracts, 現在分詞 contracting, 過去形および過去分詞形 contracted)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To draw together or nearer; to shorten, narrow, or lessen.

   The snail's body contracted into its shell.

   to contract one's sphere of action

   • 1835, William Wordsworth, The Armenian Lady's Love

     Years contracting to a moment.

   • 1675, Richard Allestree, The Government of the Tongue

     We see in all things how desuetude do's contract and narrow our faculties.

2. (grammar) 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".

3. (transitive) To enter into a contract with. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
4. (transitive) To enter into, with mutual obligations; to make a bargain or covenant for.
   • 1589, Richard Hakluyt, The Principall Navigations, Voiages, and Discoveries of the English Nation, […], imprinted at London: By George Bishop and Ralph Newberie, deputies to Christopher Barker, printer to the Queen's Most Excellent Majestie, OCLC 753964576:

     We have contracted an inviolable amitie, peace, and league with the aforesaid Queene.

   • 1721, John Strype, Ecclesiastical Memorials

     Many persons […] had contracted marriage within the degrees of consanguinity […] prohibited by law.

5. (intransitive) To make an agreement or contract; to covenant; to agree; to bargain.

   to contract for carrying the mail

6. (transitive) To bring on; to incur; to acquire.

   She contracted the habit of smoking in her teens.

   to contract a debt

   • 1717, Alexander Pope, Epistle to Mr. Jervas

     Each from each contract new strength and light.

   • c. 1703-1720, Jonathan Swift, An Essay on the Fates of Clergymen

     That kind of behaviour, which we contract by having too much conversation with persons of high station.

7. (transitive) To gain or acquire (an illness).
   • 1999, Davidson C. Umeh, Protect Your Life: A Health Handbook for Law Enforcement Professionals, page 69:

     An officer contracted hepatitis B and died after handling the blood-soaked clothing of a homicide victim […]

8. To draw together so as to wrinkle; to knit.
   • c. 1603–1604, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act III, scene iii]:

     Thou didst contract and purse thy brow.

9. To betroth; to affiance.
   • c. 1596, William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act III, scene i]:

     The truth is, she and I, long since contracted, / Are now so sure, that nothing can dissolve us.

同意語

• (lessen): abate, decrease, lessen, reduce
• (shorten): shorten, shrink
• (gain or acquire (an illness)): catch, get

反意語

• (lessen): increase, expand
• (shorten): grow, lengthen