DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT
吃水不忘掘井人
Mandarin · pinyin chī shuǐ bù wàng jué jǐng rén
Meanings
- Drinking the water of a well, one should never forget who dug it. (idiom)
Characters in this entry
- 吃
- chī · eat; drink; suffer, endure, bear
- 水
- shuǐ · water, liquid, lotion, juice
- 不
- bù · no, not; un-; negative prefix
- 忘
- wàng · forget; neglect; miss, omit
- 掘
- jué · dig, excavate; excavate cave
- 井
- jǐng · well, mine shaft, pit; surname; 22nd lunar mansion, determinative star μ Geminorum (Tejat); hexagram ䷯
- 人
- rén · man; people; mankind; someone else
Explore the spelling
Mandarin tones
1–3–4–4–2–3–2 · chi1 shui3 bu4 wang4 jue2 jing3 ren2
Compare attested words with these syllables ↗Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.
Connected dictionary
7character links
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading
hek3 seoi2 bat1 mong4 gwat6 zeng2 jan4
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
- (alt-of, alternative, idiomatic) alternative form of 吃水不忘挖井人 (chīshuǐ bù wàng wājǐng rén, “One should remember to be grateful to the people who made one's good fortune possible.”)
Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack