I was trying to see how much of the writing on the signs in the park I could
make sense of today and found something of interest.

A sign stating what not to do in the park covered not littering and in that
section was the turn of phrase `タバコのポイ`.

I could find the _meaning_ of ポイ online but so far not its origin. It means
"throwing away" or "littering".

As it's in katakana I tried to think of an English word it might be based on
but couldn't think of anything. Of course not all katakana words have origins
in English.

A local friend suggested it could be one of Japanese's famous "onomatopoeia"
words. But it seemed to me that just about all of those I'd come across are
two syllables with reduplication, and written in hiragana.

**So from whence ポイ?**
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words etymology loanwords katakana onomatopoeia
What is the origin of ポイ as in "タバコのポイ"?
Zokugo-dict [says](http://zokugo-dict.com/30ho/poisute.htm) that the word
`ポイ捨て` (litter) is a contraction of `ポイと捨てる`. And `ポイと` is an adverb meaning
"carelessly/nonchalantly" (throw away/toss aside).

It seems that now `ポイ捨て` got further contracted into just `ポイ`.
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I just had a look in Shogakukan's _Kokugo Dai Jiten Dictionary_. The ポイ in
ポイ捨て is pretty clearly the adverb ぽい(と). ぽい(と) in turn appears to be a
variation from ぷい(と), itself a variation of ふい(と), related to adverb ふ(と).

Onomatopoeitically, ふい and ふ even sound a bit like something rushing through,
possibly related to verb 吹【ふ】く "to blow", and indeed, even English has a few
similar sound "flavors" (mostly _fl-_ ) -- compare _flow_ , _fly_ , _flush_ ,
_fast_ , _flash_ , _fleet_.

The _f-_ or _h-_ > _b-_ > _p-_ shift is not uncommon in Japanese, indicating a
sharper or more immediate onset of an action. Consider ばしゃばしゃ > ぱしゃぱしゃ, or ほっと
> ぼっと > ぽっと. And again, there are even analogues in English where the sharper
consonant indicates a sharper action, such as _bing_ > _ping_ or _ding_ >
_ting_.

So ポイ seems to be etymologically related to underlying ideas of sudden-onset
action with no apparent intent or cause.
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