diff --git a/composeApp/src/commonMain/kotlin/press/mantra/compose/database/dao/NostrDao.kt b/composeApp/src/commonMain/kotlin/press/mantra/compose/database/dao/NostrDao.kt
index 938caff7..304a048c 100644
--- a/composeApp/src/commonMain/kotlin/press/mantra/compose/database/dao/NostrDao.kt
+++ b/composeApp/src/commonMain/kotlin/press/mantra/compose/database/dao/NostrDao.kt
@@ -708,6 +708,15 @@ abstract class NostrDao(
                                     }
                                 }
 
+                                // The room exists either way by here, so file the
+                                // message itself. Without this the whole branch only
+                                // ever built rooms: the payload was decrypted, stored
+                                // and dropped, and the feed reads ChatMessage.
+                                persistInboundChatMessage(
+                                    decryptedGiftWrapPayload = decryptedGiftWrapPayload,
+                                    activeKeyPair = activeKeyPair
+                                )
+
                             } else if (decryptedGiftWrapPayload.kind == WelcomeEvent.KIND) {
 
                                 val welcomeEvent = WelcomeEvent(
@@ -1238,6 +1247,63 @@ abstract class NostrDao(
     }
 
 
+    /**
+     * Files an arriving NIP-17 chat message so it shows up in the room's feed.
+     *
+     * The feed reads ChatMessage, and until now nothing wrote one for an inbound
+     * gift wrap: the payload was decrypted, stored, used to build the room, and then
+     * dropped. Members could send to each other and see their own words -- written
+     * locally by `sendChatMessage` -- while everything they were sent stayed
+     * invisible. MLS rooms were never affected, since that path builds its rows
+     * through `ChatMessage.fromGroupEventResult`.
+     *
+     * Two arrivals are deliberately not filed:
+     *
+     * A message already filed. Relays redeliver and negentropy re-syncs, and the
+     * same gift wrap yields the same payload id each time, so the payload id is what
+     * makes a second delivery a no-op rather than a second line in the chat --
+     * ChatMessage.id is autogenerated and would happily take a duplicate.
+     *
+     * Our own words coming back. `sealGiftWrapPayload` wraps a copy to every
+     * participant including the sender, so a message returns to the device that sent
+     * it, and `sendChatMessage` already wrote that row on the way out. The two copies
+     * cannot be matched on the payload id -- the outbound row is keyed on the rumor's
+     * hash and the inbound one on the seal's -- so the sender is matched instead.
+     * The cost is that a second install of the same identity will not pick up
+     * messages sent from the first; that needs the inbound payload keyed on the rumor
+     * it came from, which is a change to identity for every kind, not just this one.
+     */
+    private suspend fun persistInboundChatMessage(
+        decryptedGiftWrapPayload: GiftWrapPayload,
+        activeKeyPair: KeyPair
+    ) {
+        if (database.chatMessageDao().getChatMessagesByGiftWrapPayloadId(decryptedGiftWrapPayload.id) != null) {
+            logger.d("Chat message for payload ${decryptedGiftWrapPayload.id} is already filed")
+            return
+        }
+
+        if (decryptedGiftWrapPayload.publicKey == activeKeyPair.pubKey.toHex()) {
+            logger.d("Payload ${decryptedGiftWrapPayload.id} is our own message coming back; already stored on send")
+            return
+        }
+
+        database.chatMessageDao().upsert(
+            ChatMessage(
+                senderPublicKey = decryptedGiftWrapPayload.publicKey,
+                isUserMessage = false,
+                giftWrapPayloadId = decryptedGiftWrapPayload.id,
+                marmotGroupEventId = null,
+                marmotInnerEventId = null,
+                chatRoomId = decryptedGiftWrapPayload.chatRoomId,
+                content = decryptedGiftWrapPayload.content,
+                // The rumor's own timestamp, not the wrap's -- NIP-17 fuzzes the
+                // wrap and the seal by up to two days to frustrate correlation, and
+                // ordering the feed by that would shuffle the conversation.
+                createdAt = decryptedGiftWrapPayload.createdAt
+            )
+        )
+    }
+
     /**
      * The NIP-17 room a decrypted payload belongs to, standing it up if this is the
      * first the device has heard of the group.