United States Postal Service creed

The words "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds" have long been associated with the American postal worker. Though not an official creed or motto of the United States Postal Service, they are inscribed on New York's James Farley Post Office in New York City,[1] and the Postal Service acknowledges it as an informal motto[2] along with Charles W. Eliot's poem "The Letter".[3]

Inscription on James Farley Post Office

The phrase was a translation by Prof. George Herbert Palmer, Harvard University, from an ancient Greek work of Herodotus describing the angarium, the ancient Persian system of mounted postal carriers c. 500 B.C. The inscription was added to the building by William M. Kendall of the architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White, the building's architects. It derives from a quote from Herodotus' Histories, referring to the courier service of the ancient Persian Empire:

It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey; and these are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed.[4]

— Herodotus, Histories (8.98) (trans. A. D. Godley, 1924)

See also

References
  1. "National Postal Museum: FAQs". National Postal Museum. 2011. Retrieved 2015-04-18.
  2. "History of the United States Postal Service". Mailbox Near Me. Retrieved 2019-11-07.
  3. Postal Service Mission and “Motto”. USPS.com. Retrieved January 30, 2019.
  4. Herodotus. "The Histories". Perseus Project. Retrieved 2019-01-30.
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