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油腔滑調

简油腔滑调 · 繁油腔滑調

Mandarin · pinyin yóu qiāng huá diào

flippant and insincere (piece of writing or speech)
glib-tongued
oily

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Characters in this entry

油: yóu · oil, fat, grease, lard; paints
腔: qiāng · chest cavity; hollow in body
滑: huá · slip, slide; slippery, polished
調: Look up this written character
调: diào · transfer, move, change; tune

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

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Mandarin tones

2–1–2–4 · you2 qiang1 hua2 diao4

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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.

油腔滑調 · find source passages ↗ · 油腔滑调 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

jau4 hong1 waat6 diu6

Cantonese word readings for 油腔滑調. 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) for one's words to be unserious and insincere

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

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