Mailbox

Mailbox

Noun · /ˈmeɪl.bɒks/

Definition

(Chiefly North American) a box mounted outside a house or at the roadside for receiving postal deliveries; (Computing) a file or storage location where incoming email messages are deposited; (British) a postbox or letterbox.

Origin

From mail (post, letters — from Old French male, a leather bag) + box (from Old English box, from Latin buxus). The compound mailbox is chiefly North American — British English prefers letterbox for the slot in a door and postbox or pillar box for the street collection point. The digital sense — email inbox — is an American English extension of the physical sense, adopted universally in computing contexts.