兄弟

Mandarin · pinyin xiōng dì

Meanings

  1. brothers
  2. younger brother
  3. Classifier: 個 gè
  4. I, me (humble term used by men in public speech)
  5. brotherly
  6. fraternal
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Characters in this entry

兄
xiōng · elder brother
弟
dì · young brother; junior; I, me
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

1–4 · xiong1 di4

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 9 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

hing1 dai6

Cantonese word readings for 兄弟. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

CanCLID contributors · CC BY 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

noun

  1. (literal) brother
  2. (literal) brethren; brothers and sisters; siblings
  3. (figurative) brothers; close friends; good friends (Classifier: 位 m)
  4. (neologism, fandom slang, chiefly masculine) term to address fellow/peer-netizens on social media platforms
  5. gangster
  6. (Cantonese) groomsman

noun

  1. (Mandarin, Gan, Jin, dialectal Wu, colloquial) younger brother
  2. (colloquial) my brother; bro (A term of address for a close friend of similar age or younger)

pron

  1. A humble term of self-address used by a man to people of the same generation.

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

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

兄弟 · xiong1 di4
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 10,419
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record兄弟 兄弟 [xiong1 di4] /brothers/younger brother/CL:個|个[ge4]/I, me (humble term used by men in public speech)/brotherly/fraternal/