abbreviation
The result of abbreviating; a reduced form; an abridgement. A shortened form of a word, phrase, or symbol.

abridgement
1 The act or process of abridging; shortening; curtailment; an instance of this.

contraction
1 The action of contracting; the state of being contracted; decrease in extent, shortening, shrinking, narrowing; limitation; esp. (a) shortening of a muscle or muscles in response to a nerve impulse, generating tension in the muscle(s) and frequently producing movement.
2 a Abbreviation of a writing etc.; (an) abridgement; condensation, conciseness. Now rare or obs. The shortening of a word, syllable, etc. by combination or elision; a contracted form of a word etc.

elision
1 (An) omission of a sound, syllable, etc., running together the sounds on either side of it; (an) omission of a passage in a book etc.

pick the bones out of the OED CD ROM - PAL - abreviation can be abridgement which looks for all the world to be the same, identical, fully analogous, congruent, self-similar, and in no way mutually exclusive to contraction.

AND looking in the paper version (Principle Abbreviations) I find "RC Ch." for Roman Catholic Church (note full stop) and Rmc (no full stop) for Romanic and looking for full stops explain if you will, Mr Anonymous, How come US has no f.s.'s and W.Ind. does? OED is my arbiter and seems to be - Ah! bitty.

But I will give you p'r'aps - maybe.