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Is “of” instead of “have” correct?

It bothers me that so many people use could of, would of, should of instead of could've or could have, etc.

For instance, I have seen people write I could of been hurt or I should of seen that truck.

Does anyone know how this originated? Is this a mistake only American English speakers make, or is it common with British English speakers too?

Also, is that actually legal English?

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1  
I always thought it was more common in British than American English. But disregarding the implications of the word "legal" as applied to our language, I'm surprised OP would ask such a question of a usage which he admits "bothers him", and which he himself calls "a mistake". I'm even more surprised that the question title actually asks how such usage could have originated. – FumbleFingers Nov 18 '11 at 0:04
I too thought that this was an American failing until I moved to Europe and saw an English grammar review program on the BBC learning zone. It devoted several minutes to explaining why "could of" and similar are incorrect. – phoog Nov 18 '11 at 0:18
@FumbleFingers people ask questions when they are curious to get answers. What's surprising about it? And I asked if this was 'legal English' because, although I think it's a mistake, I could be wrong and it could, infact, be grammatically correct. – psychotik Nov 18 '11 at 1:45
Related: Is “of” instead of “have” correct? – Daniel δ Dec 17 '11 at 20:17

marked as duplicate by FumbleFingers, tchrist, MετάEd, Daniel δ, Mitch Oct 13 '12 at 20:34

This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question.

3 Answers

up vote 10 down vote accepted

The Oxford English Dictionary describes the etymology as:

Variant of have arising through misapprehension of the verb (when occurring as a clitic) as showing of.

It is described as being nonstandard and the definition is given as:

= have verb, used in the infinitive as the auxiliary of the perfect tense (especially in conjunction with modal verbs). Frequently in representations of non-standard speech.

The earliest recorded use is dated 1814, and it appears in a letter written in 1853 by the British novelist Charlotte Brontë.

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+1 Great answer because it gave me information I didn't know. To date, I'd thought this is a spelling mistake of our times. – Irene Nov 17 '11 at 19:13
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@Irene: Beware the recency illusion! :) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recency_illusion – Barrie England Nov 17 '11 at 19:24
up vote 11 down vote

I think people write could of instead could've because it sounds like could of - it is a contraction of could have that is spelled could've but sounds the same as could of. The way it would be written without the contraction is I could have been hurt.

The phrase could of seems completely incorrect to me, as I can't even understand what it would mean.

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That sounds logical - curious if there are other theories, and if this is unique to American English. If it is simply a phonetic contraction, I would assume other English speakers might do the same... – psychotik Nov 17 '11 at 18:45
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@psychotik: Strictly anecdotally, it seems to me that this can happen with English speakers anywhere. – FrustratedWithFormsDesigner Nov 17 '11 at 18:47
Sounds very plausible to me. I think we all make the mistake of using homonyms in our writing now and then. For example, writing "to" when you meant to write "too" or "night" when you meant "knight". – Bjorn Nov 17 '11 at 18:52
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+1 "Could of " is completely incorrect. The explanation you're giving is accurate, it's a spelling mistake – Irene Nov 17 '11 at 18:53
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The last answer, is right. "people write could of instead could've because it sounds like could of - it is a contraction of could have that is spelled could've but sounds the same as could of."

This is normally done by people who have a limited education in the basics of English. In the UK, I have only heard children and foreigners use it. Mainly because, they learn their language skills mainly by copying the speech of other people. Therefore, they assume that it is written in the same way. This means they are ignorant of the important nuances in English

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