衮 (gǔn): imperial dragon-robe; ceremonia…

Meanings

1 imperial dragon-robe; ceremonial gown of an emperor or the Three Dukes
2 (literary) to wear or bestow such a robe

Characters

衮

gǔn

imperial dragon-robe

Examples

天子衮服，绣以蟠龙。

Tiānzǐ gǔn fú, xiù yǐ pán lóng.

The emperor's gun robe was embroidered with coiled dragons.

衮衣绣裳出自《诗经》。

Gǔn yī xiù cháng chūzì 《 Shījīng 》.

The phrase 'dragon robe and embroidered skirt' comes from the Book of Songs.

Tips

history

衮 is a phono-semantic compound: 衣 (clothing) supplies meaning, 公 the rough sound. It also designated the gown of the 三公 (Three Dukes), so 衮职 came to mean ducal office.

usage

Almost entirely literary today — you meet it in historical writing about emperors (衮服, 衮冕) and as the phonetic of 滚 (to roll, water + 衮), 磙 (stone roller), and 蓘 (cover with earth). Remembering 'dragon robe rolling down' links 衮 to 滚 visually.

Components

radical

衣 yī

clothing; garment

The wrapping garment radical (Kangxi #145) — split here so that 公 nests inside it. Strokes 0-1 are the collar above; strokes 6-9 are the lapels and skirt below. Same V-collar pictograph that heads 装, 裳, 袋, 表 (and as 衤 in 被, 裙). Places 衮 unambiguously in the clothing family and makes the dragon-robe meaning literal: a kind of imperial garment.

phonetic

公 gōng

public; duke

Inner component nested inside the 衣 wrapper, supplying the sound (gōng → gǔn, a regular tone-and-final shift inside the same labial-velar family). Carries a quiet semantic echo too: the robe was worn by the emperor and the 三公 (Three Dukes), so a 'ducal/public garment' is a passable mnemonic gloss. Same phonetic-and-semantic doubling appears in 滚 (roll) and 衮's variant 袞.