Chinese Character Wiki
衛

wèi

guard

Phonosemantic compound. 行 represents the meaning and 韋 represents the sound.

Components
行 meaning component

行  Meaning component

xíng, háng

  

walk

韋 sound,iconic component

韋  Sound Iconic component

wéi

  

(surround a city), tanned leather

Depicts feet walking around city walls.

Evolution

衛 Bronze script Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)

Bronze script

Late Shang dynasty (~1100 BC)
衛 Oracle script (~1250-1000 BC)

Oracle script

(~1250-1000 BC)
衛 Seal script Shuowen (~100 AD)

Seal script

Shuowen (~100 AD)
衛 Clerical script Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)

Clerical script

Eastern Han dynasty (25-220 AD)
衛 Regular script Modern

Regular script

Modern
Definitions

卫 (衛) 

wèi

guard, protect, defend; to guard; to protect; to defend; abbr. for 衛生|卫生, hygiene; health; abbr. for 衛生間|卫生间, toilet

卫 (衛) 

Wèi

surname Wei; vassal state during the Zhou Dynasty (1066-221 BC), located in present day Henan and Hebei Provinces

Most common words with 衛
Freq.
Word
Meaning

卫生

health

卫星

moon

大卫

David (name)

卫

to guard

保卫

to defend

Historical pronunciation

Old Chinese

Middle Chinese

Pinyin

Gloss

*[ɢ]ʷ(r)a[t]-s

hjwejH

wèi

to guard


Statistics

Not found in HSK word list

Appears in 40.0128% of movies

802nd most common character in movies

669th most common character in books

Miscellaneous

Strokes

15

Simplified

卫

Unicode

U+885B

Shuowen

“衞，宿衞也。从韋、帀，从行。行，列衞也。”


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