דֹּאַר (do'ar) / דַּוָּר (davvar) — mail; mailman

Etymology

The Hebrew words for "mail" and "mail carrier" share a common origin with the Persian word for "judge" — and they got there through a remarkable etymological accident.

The story begins in Aramaic. Daniel 3:2 lists the officials summoned by Nebuchadnezzar: among them are דְּתָבְרַיָּא — a Persian compound: dāta (law) + bar (bearer). The dātabara was a senior legal official, a kind of judge or magistrate. The Babylonian Talmud, composed under the Sassanid Persian Empire, inherited this word in the evolved form daavar, and used the phrase בֵּי דוּאָר (house of the daavar) four times to mean a non-Jewish court. From context in Bava Kama 114a, we learn that the rabbis regarded this institution with some skepticism, though they considered it preferable to the mgistra, an apparently even more dubious court.

After the Sassanid Empire fell, the word continued in Persian through the centuries, eventually becoming the modern Persian דַאוַר — still meaning "judge." In the Islamic Republic of Iran today, soccer referees are called דַאוַר; the Arabic qadi (Islamic judge) took over for legal proceedings.

The semantic transformation happened in medieval Europe. Early post-Talmudic authorities (Hai Gaon, Rabbenu Hananel) still knew that בֵּי דוּאָר was a gentile court. But as the Talmud migrated to Europe, this knowledge was lost. Rashi interpreted it as "the city government." Rabbi Nathan of Rome, in his Talmudic dictionary "HaArukh" (11th–12th century), explained it as "a known person to whom all letters are brought, who routes and sends each letter to its intended recipient." It appears Nathan (or his teachers) misread the Shabbat 19a passage — which discusses sending a letter to the bei davar via a gentile messenger before the Sabbath — as if bei davar were a postal relay station.

This misinterpretation spread through European Jewish learning. By the 12th century, Rabbi Jacob of Orléans was already using the word in its new sense. The pronunciation shifted too: where the vav had been read as a consonant (da-war), European rabbis read it as a vowel letter (do-ar). The Haskalah period adopted this form as the Hebrew equivalent for the foreign word Post, and it remains the word in use today.

The word דַּוָּר (mail carrier) was only coined in 1935, by the newspaper Doar HaYom — most likely by its founder, Itamar Ben-Avi, who introduced it in a news item about German Jews immigrating to Palestine following the Nazi rise to power. A footnote explained: "The name dawar is derived from the word do'ar and means 'letter carrier.'"

Key Quotes

"בי דינא דְּתָבְרַיָּא" — דניאל ג', ב' (ארמית)

"איש ידוע שכל כתב אליו יובל והוא המשכיר ומשלח כל איגרת למי שנשתלחה לו" — רבי נתן מרומי, ״הערוך״ (פירוש שגוי ל״בי דואר״)

"הבחור הזה הבא עם הדואר" — רבי יעקב מאורליינש, מכתב לרבי אפריים מבון, מאה ה-12

Timeline

• ~540 BCE: Old Persian dātabara (law-bearer) used in the Persian Empire
• ~165 BCE: Daniel 3:2 (Aramaic) records דְּתָבְרַיָּא (plural)
• 3rd–6th century CE: Babylonian Talmud uses בֵּי דוּאָר = Persian court of law
• 7th–10th century: Post-Talmudic authorities still know בֵּי דוּאָר = court
• 11th–12th century: Rabbi Nathan of Rome misreads it as a postal institution
• 12th century: Rabbi Jacob of Orléans uses דוּאָר in "mail" sense
• Haskalah period: דֹּאַר adopted as Hebrew equivalent of "Post"
• 1935: דַּוָּר coined by Itamar Ben-Avi in Doar HaYom

Related Words

• דַּוָּר — mail carrier (coined 1935 from דֹּאַר)
• תֵּיבַת דֹּאַר — mailbox
• דֹּאַר אֲוִיר — airmail
• דֹּאַר אֶלֶקְטְרוֹנִי — email (lit. "electronic mail")