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宵衣旰食

Mandarin · pinyin xiāo yī gàn shí

to dress before light and not eat before dark (idiom)
diligently attending to official matters

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Characters in this entry

宵: xiāo · night, evening, dark
衣: yī · clothes, clothing; cover, skin; Kangxi radical 145
旰: gàn · sunset, dusk; evening
食: shí · eat; meal; food; Kangxi radical 184

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

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Mandarin tones

1–1–4–2 · xiao1 yi1 gan4 shi2

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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 · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

siu1 ji1 gon3 sik6

Cantonese word readings for 宵衣旰食. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

phrase

(idiomatic) Very hard-working.

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

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