窩裡橫

简 窝里横 · 繁 窩裡橫
Mandarin · pinyin wō li hèng

Meanings

  1. (coll.) meek and civil in public, but a tyrant at home
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Characters in this entry

窩
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裡
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橫
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窝
wō · nest; cave, den; hiding place
里
lǐ · unit of distance; village; lane; Kangxi radical 166
横
héng · across
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

1–5–4 · wo1 li5 heng4

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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.

verb

  1. (of a person) to seem polite and civilised in public, and only reveal their bad temper, unreasonableness, nastiness, etc. at home

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

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