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秀外慧中

Mandarin · pinyin xiù wài huì zhōng

good-looking and intelligent (idiom)

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Characters in this entry

秀: xiù · ear of grain; flowering, luxuriant; refined, elegant, graceful
外: wài · out, outside, external; foreign
慧: huì · bright, intelligent; intelligence
中: zhōng · central; center, middle; in the midst of; hit (target); attain

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

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Mandarin tones

4–4–4–1 · xiu4 wai4 hui4 zhong1

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4character links1same-tone record

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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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Rime Cantonese 粵拼

sau3 ngoi6 wai6 zung1

Cantonese word readings for 秀外慧中. 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

(usually of a girl) good-looking and intelligent

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

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