Courier

How to spell courier

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce courier

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does courier mean?

1. nounA person or company that delivers parcels, documents, or messages, often urgently.

Courier in a sentence

• The signed contract was sent back by courier the same afternoon.

• A motorcycle courier weaved through the traffic to reach the office on time.

Where does courier come from?

Language of origin: French

The word traces back to the Latin verb currere, which simply meant 'to run', the same root that gives us 'current', 'course' and 'corridor'. From this came a Late Latin notion of a runner who carried messages, which passed into Italian as corriere and then into Old French as courrier, both naming a fast messenger. English adopted it in the late 1300s, originally for a state messenger who hurried official dispatches between courts and armies. Over the centuries the sense softened from the breathless royal runner to the everyday person or company that delivers parcels and documents. The doubled spelling traps come from that French ancestry: the 'ou' and the agent ending '-ier' both survive almost unchanged, which is why writers reaching for a phonetic spelling often slip.

How the word is built

• cour- (from Latin currere: to run)
• -ier (agent suffix: one who does)