A postal village is generally a community, settlement, or hamlet (place) that has a post office and is designated as such by the postal administration. It may be seen as a rural neighbourhood.
This term seems to have been most common in the latter half of the 19th century when it was in common use in maps and gazetteers, variously abbreviated p.v., P.V., PV, and p-v. The term is generally used for a community within a township (rural region) as opposed to an incorporated village or other municipal government. By establishing a post office in a particular community it receives official recognition, often for the first time, for a name, an important step in the development of any community.
Famous quotes containing the words postal and/or village:
“none
Thought of the others they would never meet
Or how their lives would all contain this hour.
I thought of London spread out in the sun,
Its postal districts packed like squares of wheat:”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1985)
“Ezra Pound still lives in a village and his world is a kind of village and people keep explaining things when they live in a village.... I have come not to mind if certain people live in villages and some of my friends still appear to live in villages and a village can be cozy as well as intuitive but must one really keep perpetually explaining and elucidating?”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)