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世代

Mandarin · pinyin shì dài

for many generations
generation
era
age

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Characters in this entry

世: shì · generation; world; era
代: dài · replace, replacement (of person or generation); era, generation

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

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Mandarin tones

4–4 · shi4 dai4

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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

sai3 doi6

Cantonese word readings for 世代. 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

(literary) era; age; period; epoch

adv

(literary) over the course of several generations; from generation to generation; down through the generations; through successive generations

verb

(literary) to pass on from one generation to the next

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

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