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土鱉

简土鳖 · 繁土鱉

Mandarin · pinyin tǔ biē

ground beetle
(coll.) professional or entrepreneur who, unlike a 海歸 hǎi guī, has never studied overseas
(dialect) country bumpkin

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Characters in this entry

土: tǔ · soil, earth; items made of earth
鱉: Look up this written character
鳖: biē · turtle

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

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Mandarin tones

3–1 · tu3 bie1

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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.

土鱉 · find source passages ↗ · 土鳖 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 4 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

tou2 bit3

Cantonese word readings for 土鱉. 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 · Etymology 1

Chinese ground beetle (Eupolyphaga sinensis)
(dialectal, figurative) old-fashioned person; one who has seen nothing of life
(neologism) one who has never studied/lived overseas

noun · Etymology 2

(Hokkien) alternative form of 塗鱉 /涂鳖

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

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