俯首帖耳

Mandarin · pinyin fǔ shǒu tiē ěr

Meanings

  1. bowed head and ears glued (idiom); docile and obedient
  2. at sb's beck and call
Full entryShow on map

Characters in this entry

俯
fǔ · bow down, face down, look down
首
shǒu · head; first; leader, chief; a poem; Kangxi radical 185
帖
tiē · invitation card; notice
耳
ěr · ear; merely, only; handle; Kangxi radical 128
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

Explore the spelling

Mandarin tones

3–3–1–3 · fu3 shou3 tie1 er3

Compare attested words with these syllables ↗

Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.

Connected dictionary

4character links
Explore word families ↗Compare pronunciations ↗Open character structure ↗
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.

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.

俯首帖耳 · find source passages ↗

Explore Classical grammar ↗

Compare dictionary sources 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

fu2 sau2 tip3 ji5

Cantonese word readings for 俯首帖耳. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

CanCLID contributors · CC BY 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

俯首帖耳 · fu3 shou3 tie1 er3
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 8,506
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record俯首帖耳 俯首帖耳 [fu3 shou3 tie1 er3] /bowed head and ears glued (idiom); docile and obedient/at sb's beck and call/