Windows

PATH /?
Displays or sets a search path for executable files.

PATH [[drive:]path[;...]]
PATH ;

Type PATH ; to clear all search-path settings and direct MS-DOS to search only in the current directory.
Type PATH without parameters to display the current path.

It comes from the operating system's INI file.

Without those paths, the programs that you have installed over time would not work.

You can look in your windows folder for your .INI files, check them all out. Find the one with all the paths inside of it and remove duplicates.

Now, be careful as some of the paths might be c:\program files\whatever and some might be c:\progra~1\whatever... one is windows version, one is dos 8 character version...

Good luck

As mentioned the paths are coming from installed software. The main path for windows is
C:\windows\command. There's others that may need the path in order fro the software to work correctly. This shouldn't be a problem. But if you look in MSCONFIG the path statements will be listed there.

If You login using a netware client any mapped search drives will be appended to the path statement.