DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT

束手

Mandarin · pinyin shù shǒu

to have one's hands tied
helpless
unable to do anything about it

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Characters in this entry

束: shù · bind, control, restrain; bale
手: shǒu · hand

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

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Mandarin tones

4–3 · shu4 shou3

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2character links1same-tone record

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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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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

verb

to be helpless; to have one's hands tied

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

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