post road
- noun
- /poʊst roʊd/
- Archaic
:
camino postal
- The government improved the post road to ensure faster mail delivery between towns.
Examples
-
" This means the collective nation as a whole, i.e., providing docks, river dredging, post roads, etc.
Blog text (33) -
At the far end of this street, where the land rose to the level of the old post road, the Alford house occupied a little knoll that commanded the street and also, to the west, a fine view of the little agricultural land along the Buttermilk River, more a stream at this point than its name implies.
Fiction book (1994) -
In the early 1800s, carriers traveled long distances along the post road to deliver letters and packages.
-
Many stagecoaches used the old post road to transport mail across the countryside.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a road for transporting mail' is directly derivable from combining 'post' (postal mail) with 'road' (a route or way); it follows a common noun+noun compounding pattern where the first noun specifies purpose or association. Although somewhat historical, the composition is literal and cross-linguistically transparent, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Post road is an old name from times when mail moved by horse and coach; a post was the mail service or a place where riders changed horses and a road was the route they used. That's why 'post road' means 'a road for carrying mail'.
