郢 书 燕 说

Yǐng shū Yān shuōdictionary entry

lit. Ying writes a letter and Yan reads it / fig. to misinterpret the original meaning / to pile up errors / refers to the letter from capital 郢[Yǐng] of 楚[Chǔ] in which the inadvertent words "hold up the candle" are mistaken by the minister of 燕[Yān] as "promote the wise"

Sources & editorial notes

Reference definitions: CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG, CC BY-SA 4.0. Source release 2026-10-27T01:55:52Z. Imported 2026-10-27. Definition wording and meaning order are retained. Recognized pronunciation references are displayed with tone marks; the original source record is available below.

Source record: cd-4d20c8a4968b3508. Source SHA-256: bbc4b27f26bee1a262f4d7939667a040c7857c7fc0200a2fa7a86d3352a09eae.

Original source entry:

郢書燕說 郢书燕说 [Ying3 shu1 Yan1 shuo1] /lit. Ying writes a letter and Yan reads it/fig. to misinterpret the original meaning/to pile up errors/refers to the letter from capital 郢[Ying3] of 楚[Chu3] in which the inadvertent words "hold up the candle" are mistaken by the minister of 燕[Yan1] as "promote the wise"/

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Reference information

The definitions above are from CC-CEDICT. Examples and usage notes are available on selected entries.

Character information

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Other forms in these source records: 郢書燕說

Reference definitions from CC-CEDICT.