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殘花敗柳

简残花败柳 · 繁殘花敗柳

Mandarin · pinyin cán huā bài liǔ

broken flower, withered willow (idiom); fig. fallen woman

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Characters in this entry

殘: Look up this written character
花: huā · flower; blossoms
敗: Look up this written character
柳: liǔ · willow tree; pleasure; 24th lunar mansion, determinative star δ Hydrae
残: cán · injure, spoil; oppress; broken
败: bài · be defeated, decline, fail

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

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Mandarin tones

2–1–4–3 · can2 hua1 bai4 liu3

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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.

殘花敗柳 · find source passages ↗ · 残花败柳 · find source passages ↗

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Rime Cantonese 粵拼

caan4 faa1 baai6 lau5

Cantonese word readings for 殘花敗柳. 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

(figurative, derogatory) impure woman, such as one who leads a promiscuous life, or one who has been abused and abandoned; fallen woman

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

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