Talk:い

In the etymology of this particle, it says it was found in Chinese works annotated for Japanese readers. Wouldn't it be a good idea to indicate whether its origin is Chinese or not? Maybe it's not Korean?

Also, perhaps it'd be nice to indicate it was used in literary works only - or is there any other evidence it was used in speech? (Probable there is not such evidence, but I thought it would be a good idea to let people know).

Best regards.

--Ikemen maru (talk) 13:46, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

• The etymology of the particle (Etymology 2 at the time of this writing) is clearly listed as Old Japanese. In Wiktionary's notation, this means that the particle comes from Old Japanese. The Korean particle 이 (i) is described as a possible cognate. A cognate is a separate word that shares the same origin. In this case, the etymology suggests that Old Japanese い (i) and Korean 이 (i) might come from the same origin. It does not say that the Old Japanese particle is either Chinese or Korean.

Regarding usage, some further detail is available here on the Kotobank page, showing entries from Daijisen and Daijirin. My big dead-tree version of Shogakukan's {{R:Kokugo Dai Jiten}} gives the following:

❶《副助》（上代に用いられたが、訓点資料では平安初期にも広く見られ、その後は、法相、律、三論等の宗派の仏典訓読にかたよって現れる）...

Examples are given from the w:Kojiki, as well as various 訓読 (kundoku) annotations from the early w:Heian period. From the sources I have read so far, it seems that usage was declining even as literacy was spreading, and as such, I doubt there will be any direct evidence of this particle in use in vernacular or colloquial contexts, since this kind of language use was not recorded at these early stages of Japanese history. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 07:45, 3 June 2015 (UTC)