役 — Chinese character
役
yì
servant, laborer; service; to serve
- Pinyin
- yì
- Radical
- 60 ⼻ (Step)
- Strokes
- 7
- Components
- 彳 殳
- Formation
- ideographic — A person walking over 彳 with food in hand 殳
- Japanese
- 役 as a kanji
Common words with 役
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 战役 (戰役) | zhàn yì | military campaign |
| 奴役 | nú yì | to enslave |
| 服役 | fú yì | to serve in the army; in active service |
| 退役 | tuì yì | (of military personnel or athletes) to retire; (of outdated equipment) to be decommissioned |
| 现役 (現役) | xiàn yì | (military) active duty; (sports) currently active (player, athlete etc) |
| 预备役 (預備役) | yù bèi yì | reserve duty; reserve service; military reserve |
| 兵役 | bīng yì | military service |
| 拘役 | jū yì | detention |
| 仆役 (僕役) | pú yì | servant |
| 劳役 (勞役) | láo yì | forced labor; corvée (labor required of a serf) |
| 服兵役 | fú bīng yì | to serve in the army |
| 苦役 | kǔ yì | forced labor; corvée |
English words written with 役
役 in the Chinese classics
Occurrences: Art of War 3 · Mencius 12 · Zhuangzi 17
- Art of War 2.8
- Art of War 2.12
- Art of War 8.10
- Mencius 2A.7
- Mencius 4A.7
- Mencius 5B.7
- Mencius 6B.5
- Mencius 7B.27
Data: Make Me a Hanzi (Arphic Public License (graphics.txt); LGPL-3.0-or-later (dictionary.txt)); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3); CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0). Retrieved 2026-10-22.