[kaoD]

Don't be obtuse ;)

Since you're the one claiming "verbal" equals "oral", you're the one who's supposed to do the research. Wikipedia has a citation on that specific paragraph and there are lots of results in Google. Do your homework before your claims.

But anyways, "verbum, verbi" means "word" in Latin while "os, oris" means "mouth". That should be a clue.

[DanBC]

"Verbal contract" always refers to spoken contracts!

This is about usage, not definition. To interrupt a hrwad with a pointless aside in a snarky manner about a common (mis)use of "verbal" deserves a downvote.

Your inability to find an example of someone using "verbal contract" to mean "written contract" has been noted. :p

[kaoD]

> Your inability to find an example of someone using "verbal contract" to mean "written contract" has been noted. :p

Did you even search Google? Do your homework!

[DanBC]

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/wales/consumer_w/consumer_prot...

here's one. Oh wait, they're using verbal to talk about oral contracts.

http://www.contractsandagreements.co.uk/law-and-verbal-agree...

here's another. oh wait! they're doing the same.

http://www.independent.co.uk/student/young-entrepreneurs/con...

Here's one from a national UK newspaper. They're using verbal to mean oral.

Here's another UK newspaper: http://careers.theguardian.com/careers-blog/contracts-employ...

And again, they carefully use written to mean written and verbal to mean spoken.

The first two pages of my Google search failed to show anyone using "verbal contract" to mean "written contract" - and it's pretty obvious why. A written contract is just a contract, or if you really need to specify whether it's written or spoken you'd be obtuse to use the word "verbal" to describe a written contract.

Perhaps it's a US / UK thing?

EDIT: put more smilies in.