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錦衣衛

简锦衣卫 · 繁錦衣衛

Mandarin · pinyin Jǐn yī wèi

Brocade Uniform Guard, imperial bodyguard and secret police force of the Ming emperors

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Characters in this entry

錦: Look up this written character
衣: yī · clothes, clothing; cover, skin; Kangxi radical 145
衛: Look up this written character
锦: jǐn · brocade, tapestry; embroidered
卫: wèi · guard, protect, defend

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

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Mandarin tones

3–1–4 · Jin3 yi1 wei4

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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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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

name

(historical) Embroidered Uniform Guard (the imperial secret police that served the emperors of the Ming dynasty)

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

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