ראָווער
־ס
דער
'bicycle'

ETYMOLOGY

{Note: as a modern anglicism via Polish, this word has no Proto-Yiddish reconstruction or protovowel. Mainly used by descendants of interwar Polish Jews. {Katz}}

I. Borrowed into Yiddish from Polish rower 'bicycle'.

II. Polish rower, from the brand name of the Rover Company Limited, founded 1877 in Coventry by John Kemp Starley and William Sutton. The company's Rover Safety Bicycle (1885) — with its chain-driven rear wheel and equal-sized wheels — became the template for the modern bicycle and was enormously influential across Europe, to the point that the brand name became the generic term for bicycle in Polish and several other languages.

III. English rover 'wanderer, one who roves', from the verb rove 'to wander' + agent suffix -er. The etymology of rove is disputed: possibly from Dutch roven 'to plunder, rob' (whence also 'sea rover' = pirate), or from archery terminology (to shoot at marks at varying distances), with the earliest English attestations in the 15th century. {Katz; Boryś s.v. koło, kolarz.}