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傾城

简倾城 · 繁傾城

Mandarin · pinyin qīng chéng

coming from everywhere
from all over the place
gorgeous (of woman)
to ruin and overturn the state

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Characters in this entry

傾: Look up this written character
城: chéng · castle; city, town; municipality
倾: qīng · upset, pour out, overflow

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

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Mandarin tones

1–2 · qing1 cheng2

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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.

傾城 · find source passages ↗ · 倾城 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 4 senses

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

verb

(literary) to make a city or state collapse

adj

(literary, figurative, of a woman) drop-dead gorgeous; extremely beautiful (and having the potential of bringing about the downfall of an empire)

noun

(literary, figurative) drop-dead gorgeous woman; beauty who could drive a man to distraction (and bring about the downfall of an empire)
(literary) the entire city; all over the place

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

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