Is the word ムキムキ a deliberate visual pun?


I recently learned the word ムキムキ and what instantly struck me was how it
appears to be some kind of a visual pun.

ム representing a flexed arm

キ representing a classic barbell

Together they appear to be a set of arms exercising which seems appropriate
considering the word means muscular/brawny. Is this just a coincidence?

I have found one [blog post](https://midorixde.exblog.jp/26707302/) which
seems to suggests it comes from the German word 'Muskel' but the phonetic
translation seems to be quite different.




Expanding on kandyman's answer.

### Origins of _mukimuki_ : probably not German

According to the Shogakukan _Kokugo Dai Jiten_ (KDJ) entry
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184), the first cited
textual instance of a word _mukimuki_ is way back in the 700s in the
_Man'yōshū_ poetry anthology. This is much older than the German word _Muskel_
("muscle"), of which _Mucki_ is a derivation. Per the **Herkunft**
("Etymology") section in the Duden entry
[here](https://www.duden.de/rechtschreibung/Muskel#herkunft), _Muskel_ traces
back to Latin _musculus_ ("little mouse"), presumably from the way a flexing
muscle looks a bit like a small animal moving around.

### Origins of _mukimuki_ : sense development

Again per [the KDJ
entry](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184), _mukimuki_ meant
something more like "each going in whichever facing ( _muki_ ) or direction",
and this extended to a sense of "different preferences and inclinations". We
see similar senses listed in the Daijisen and Daijirin entries
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E3%81%8D%E5%90%91%E3%81%8D-641095).

So far, none of these list any sense related to "muscular". We don't find that
until we look
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D-641096)
in the Daijisen entry for the kana-only spellizang むきむき, or
[here](https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D) in
the Japanese Wiktionary.

I can't find anything directly relevant to how the "muscular" sense arose. I
suspect two possibilities:

  * From the oldest sense of "each going in whichever direction", developing from the idea of "able to go whatever way", to "capable / strong" in general, and from there to "muscular".  
This seems less likely, given the sizable semantic (meaning-wise) gap between
"each in their own direction" to "muscular". The KDJ in particular is pretty
good about listing historical development where known, and [their entry for
向き向き](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184) is missing any such
details.

  * Instead, a vowel shift and slight semantic shift from similarly-structured adverb _mukumuku_ ("thickly, in a billowing or bulging manner"), first [cited in the KDJ](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8F%E3%82%80%E3%81%8F-641167#E7.B2.BE.E9.81.B8.E7.89.88.20.E6.97.A5.E6.9C.AC.E5.9B.BD.E8.AA.9E.E5.A4.A7.E8.BE.9E.E5.85.B8) to a text from 1254.  
_Mukumuku_ is limited to soft contexts, things like cotton batting or clouds
or smoke. However, here we do have nearly the same word, with a similar
"bulging" sense. There is at least one other example of a reduplicative adverb
pair with one ending in _-u_ and the other in _-i_ , specifically _kurukuru_ ↔
_kurikuri_ , of overlapping but not identical meanings. The pair _sukusuku_ ↔
_sukisuki_ also have close senses and may be related, demonstrating a similar
structure.

### Tentative conclusion about the derivation

While I cannot find anything definitively stating when the "muscular" sense
arose, I suspect it is significantly older than contact between Japanese
speakers and German speakers, and indeed possibly older than the German word
_Mucki_ itself. As others have noted, this Japanese word is also much older
than emoji.




Expanding on kandyman's answer.

### Origins of _mukimuki_ : probably not German

According to the Shogakukan _Kokugo Dai Jiten_ (KDJ) entry
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184), the first cited
textual instance of a word _mukimuki_ is way back in the 700s in the
_Man'yōshū_ poetry anthology. This is much older than the German word _Muskel_
("muscle"), of which _Mucki_ is a derivation. Per the **Herkunft**
("Etymology") section in the Duden entry
[here](https://www.duden.de/rechtschreibung/Muskel#herkunft), _Muskel_ traces
back to Latin _musculus_ ("little mouse"), presumably from the way a flexing
muscle looks a bit like a small animal moving around.

### Origins of _mukimuki_ : sense development

Again per [the KDJ
entry](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184), _mukimuki_ meant
something more like "each going in whichever facing ( _muki_ ) or direction",
and this extended to a sense of "different preferences and inclinations". We
see similar senses listed in the Daijisen and Daijirin entries
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E3%81%8D%E5%90%91%E3%81%8D-641095).

So far, none of these list any sense related to "muscular". We don't find that
until we look
[here](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D-641096)
in the Daijisen entry for the kana-only spellizang むきむき, or
[here](https://ja.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D%E3%82%80%E3%81%8D) in
the Japanese Wiktionary.

I can't find anything directly relevant to how the "muscular" sense arose. I
suspect two possibilities:

  * From the oldest sense of "each going in whichever direction", developing from the idea of "able to go whatever way", to "capable / strong" in general, and from there to "muscular".  
This seems less likely, given the sizable semantic (meaning-wise) gap between
"each in their own direction" to "muscular". The KDJ in particular is pretty
good about listing historical development where known, and [their entry for
向き向き](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%90%91%E5%90%91-2086184) is missing any such
details.

  * Instead, a vowel shift and slight semantic shift from similarly-structured adverb _mukumuku_ ("thickly, in a billowing or bulging manner"), first [cited in the KDJ](https://kotobank.jp/word/%E3%82%80%E3%81%8F%E3%82%80%E3%81%8F-641167#E7.B2.BE.E9.81.B8.E7.89.88.20.E6.97.A5.E6.9C.AC.E5.9B.BD.E8.AA.9E.E5.A4.A7.E8.BE.9E.E5.85.B8) to a text from 1254.  
_Mukumuku_ is limited to soft contexts, things like cotton batting or clouds
or smoke. However, here we do have nearly the same word, with a similar
"bulging" sense. There is at least one other example of a reduplicative adverb
pair with one ending in _-u_ and the other in _-i_ , specifically _kurukuru_ ↔
_kurikuri_ , of overlapping but not identical meanings. The pair _sukusuku_ ↔
_sukisuki_ also have close senses and may be related, demonstrating a similar
structure.

### Tentative conclusion about the derivation

While I cannot find anything definitively stating when the "muscular" sense
arose, I suspect it is significantly older than contact between Japanese
speakers and German speakers, and indeed possibly older than the German word
_Mucki_ itself. As others have noted, this Japanese word is also much older
than emoji.

