口乾舌燥
简 口干舌燥 · 繁 口乾舌燥Meanings
- lit. dry mouth and tongue (idiom); to talk too much
Characters in this entry
- 口
- kǒu · mouth; open end; entrance, gate
- 乾
- qián · gān · dry; warming principle of the sun, penetrating and fertilizing, heavenly generative principle (male); trigram ☰; hexagram ䷀
- 舌
- shé · tongue; clapper of bell; Kangxi radical 135
- 燥
- zào · dry, parched, arid; quick-tempered
- 干
- gàn · oppose, offend; invade; dried
Explore the spelling
Mandarin tones
3–1–2–4 · kou3 gan1 she2 zao4
Compare attested words with these syllables ↗Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.
Connected dictionary
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.
口乾舌燥 · find source passages ↗ · 口干舌燥 · find source passages ↗
Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading
Rime Cantonese 粵拼
hau2 gon1 sit3 cou3
Cantonese word readings for 口乾舌燥. 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.
phrase
- (idiomatic) dry mouth and sore throat; having spoken so much that one's mouth and throat become thirsty
Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack