拍案

Mandarin · pinyin pāi àn

Meanings

  1. lit. to slap the table (in amazement, praise, anger, resentment etc)
  2. fig. astonishing!, wonderful!, dreadful! etc
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Characters in this entry

拍
pāi · clap, tap, beat; beat or rhythm
案
àn · table, bench; legal case
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Mandarin tones

1–4 · pai1 an4

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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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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

verb

  1. to pound (or strike) the table

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

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

拍案 · pai1 an4
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 46,264
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record拍案 拍案 [pai1 an4] /lit. to slap the table (in amazement, praise, anger, resentment etc)/fig. astonishing!, wonderful!, dreadful! etc/