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敵眾我寡

简敌众我寡 · 繁敵眾我寡

Mandarin · pinyin dí zhòng wǒ guǎ

multitude of enemies, few friends (idiom from Mencius)
heavily outnumbered
beaten by the weight of numbers

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Characters in this entry

敵: Look up this written character
眾: Look up this written character
我: wǒ · our, us, i, me, my, we
寡: guǎ · widowed; alone, friendless
敌: dí · enemy, foe, rival; resist
众: zhòng · multitude, crowd; masses, public

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

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Mandarin tones

2–4–3–3 · di2 zhong4 wo3 gua3

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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.

敵眾我寡 · find source passages ↗ · 敌众我寡 · find source passages ↗

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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) to be outnumbered by one's enemy

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

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