King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “shackle”

束缚
shù fù
Traditional: 束縛
to bind; to tie up; to fetter; to shackle

The closest CC-CEDICT match for shackle is 束缚 (shù fù), defined as: to bind; to tie up; to fetter; to shackle.

Before using these characters for a tattoo, check them with a native speaker. Dictionary words often have several meanings, and the right choice depends on context.

Characters and stroke order

束 shù
to bind, to control, to restrain; bale
radical 75 ⽊ · 7 strokes
缚 fù
to tie, to bind
radical 120 ⽷ · 13 strokes

Traditional forms

Other Chinese words for “shackle”

WordPinyinMeaning
牢笼 (牢籠)láo lóngcage; trap (e.g. basket, pit or snare for catching animals)
卸扣xiè kòushackle (U-shaped link)
钩环 (鉤環)gōu huánshackle (U-shaped link)

Related words

Other words that share a character with 束缚.

WordPinyinMeaning
结束 (結束)jié shùto end; to finish; to conclude
约束 (約束)yuē shùto restrict; to limit to
拘束jū shùto restrict; to restrain
光束guāng shùlight beam
束手无策 (束手無策)shù shǒu wú cèlit. to have one's hands bound and be unable to do anything about it (idiom); fig. helpless in the face of a crisis
作茧自缚 (作繭自縛)zuò jiǎn zì fùto spin a cocoon around oneself (idiom); enmeshed in a trap of one's own devising; hoist by his own petard
捆缚 (捆縛)kǔn fùbondage
绑缚 (綁縛)bǎng fùto tie up; to bind

See also: Japanese symbol for “shackle”.

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3); Make Me a Hanzi (Arphic Public License (graphics.txt); LGPL-3.0-or-later (dictionary.txt)); wordfreq (CC BY-SA 4.0 (data)). Retrieved 2026-10-22.

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