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做牛做馬

简 做牛做马 · 繁 做牛做馬
Mandarin · pinyin zuò niú zuò mǎ

Meanings

  1. lit. to work like an ox, to work like a horse; fig. to work extremely hard
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Characters in this entry

做
zuò · work, make; act
牛
niú · cow, ox, bull; Kangxi radical 93; 9th lunar mansion, determinative star β Capricorni (Dabih)
馬
Look up this written character
马
mǎ · horse; surname; Kangxi radical 187
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Entries containing 做牛做馬 ↗Words written with 做 ↗Words written with 牛 ↗Words written with 馬 ↗Words written with 马 ↗

Mandarin tones

4–2–4–3 · zuo4 niu2 zuo4 ma3

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 2 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

zou6 ngau4 zou6 maa5

Pleco · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Word reading; meanings not aligned.

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

  1. (idiomatic) to work one's butt off; to work extremely hard
  2. (idiomatic) to lower one's dignity to do everything and anything for someone

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

做牛做馬 · zuo4 niu2 zuo4 ma3
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 9,221
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record做牛做馬 做牛做马 [zuo4 niu2 zuo4 ma3] /lit. to work like an ox, to work like a horse; fig. to work extremely hard/