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奴顏婢膝

简奴颜婢膝 · 繁奴顏婢膝

Mandarin · pinyin nú yán bì xī

servile and bending the knee (idiom); fawning
bending and scraping to curry favor

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Characters in this entry

奴: nú · slave, servant
顏: Look up this written character
婢: bì · servant girl; your servant
膝: xī · knee
颜: yán · face, facial appearance

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

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Mandarin tones

2–2–4–1 · nu2 yan2 bi4 xi1

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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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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

(idiomatic) subservient; servile

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

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