尉 (wèi): military officer

Meanings

1 military officer
2 low-ranking military officer (lieutenant/captain level)

Characters

尉

wèi

military officer

Examples

他被提升为尉官。

Tā bèi tíshēng wèi wèi guān.

He was promoted to the rank of officer.

古代的军队中有各级尉官。

Gǔdài de jūnduì zhōng yǒu gè jí wèi guān.

Ancient armies had officers of various ranks.

Tips

history

In the Chinese military rank system, 尉 refers to the junior officer level — specifically 少尉 (second lieutenant), 中尉 (first lieutenant), and 上尉 (captain). It is the lowest tier of commissioned officers.

memory

Note the pronunciation: 尉 as a rank is wèi. When used in the surname 尉迟 or place name 尉犁, it is read yù — a rare exception.

Components

radical

寸 cùn

inch; hand-measure

Right 寸 — a hand with the thumb marking a measured inch, the indexing radical. Carries the meaning of careful manual action: pressing, applying, taking charge. The military rank sense (lieutenant) came from the older notion of someone who 'applies' authority over a small unit, hand on the rein.

semantic

尸 shī

cloth; flat object (here graphic)

Top-left 尸 — originally pictured a folded cloth or a hot iron viewed from the side, not the modern 'corpse' sense. Here it represents the pressing-iron or seal being applied. The Kangxi radical is 寸 (the hand at right), so 尸 here is a semantic helper, not the indexer.

semantic

示 shì

altar; surface (here graphic)

Lower-left 示 — usually 'altar' but here functioning as the flat surface or anvil on which something is pressed. The graph 尉 originally depicted ironing a wrinkle out of cloth, hand pressing fabric onto a smooth board; later borrowed for the title 'military officer' through unrelated sound.