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螺

Mandarin · pinyin luó

spiral shell
snail
conch

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螺: luó · spiral shell; conch; spiral

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

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Mandarin tones

2 · luo2

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1character link24same-tone records

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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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Rime Cantonese 粵拼

lo4

Cantonese word readings for 螺. 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.

character

aquatic snail (as opposed to a terrestrial snail, 蝸 /蜗 (wō))
whorl; swirl; spiral
fingerprint whorls
(organic chemistry) spiro-
(transgender slang) short for 螺內酯／螺内酯 (luónèizhǐ, “spironolactone”); spiro
(historical) wine cup made from a snail shell
(historical) ink; pigment (green-black in color, produced from the snail, and used by women for drawing eyebrows)
(abbreviation, alt-of) short for 螺髻 (“hair done up in a coil shape”)

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

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