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八字

Mandarin · pinyin bā zì

the character 8 or 八
birthdate characters used in fortune-telling

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Characters in this entry

八: bā · eight; all around, all sides
字: zì · letter, character, word

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

1–4 · ba1 zi4

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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 · 2 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

baat3 zi6

Cantonese word readings for 八字. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

noun

(literally) the character 八
eight characters that indicate the year, month, date and double-hour of one's birth, used in fortune-telling

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

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