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要麼

简要么 · 繁要麼

Mandarin · pinyin yào me

or
either one or the other

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Characters in this entry

要: yào · necessary, essential; necessity
麼: me · interrogative final particle; insignificant, small, tiny
么: me · interrogative particle; small

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

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Mandarin tones

4–5 · yao4 me5

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3character 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.

要麼 · find source passages ↗ · 要么 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

jiu3 mo1

Cantonese word readings for 要麼. 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.

conj

either ... or ...; or

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

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