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丈人

Mandarin · pinyin zhàng rén

wife's father (father-in-law)
old man

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Characters in this entry

丈: zhàng · unit of length equal 3.3 meters; gentleman, man, husband
人: rén · man; people; mankind; someone else

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

4–2 · zhang4 ren2

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 5 senses

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

noun

father-in-law (wife's father)

noun

(archaic) venerable old man
(archaic) head of a household; family head; patriarch
(archaic, of a married woman) one's husband
(archaic) paternal grandfather (one's father's father)

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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