美麗島

简 美丽岛 · 繁 美麗島
Mandarin · pinyin Měi lì Dǎo

Meanings

  1. Formosa (from Ilha Formosa, "Beautiful Isle", the name given to Taiwan Island by passing Portuguese mariners in 1544)
Full entryShow on map

Characters in this entry

美
měi · beautiful, pretty; pleasing
麗
lì · beautiful, magnificent, elegant
島
Look up this written character
丽
lì · beautiful, magnificent, elegant
岛
dǎo · island
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

Explore the spelling

Mandarin tones

3–4–3 · Mei3 li4 Dao3

Compare attested words with these syllables ↗

Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.

Connected dictionary

4character links
Explore word families ↗Compare pronunciations ↗Open character structure ↗
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.

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.

美麗島 · find source passages ↗ · 美丽岛 · find source passages ↗

Explore Classical grammar ↗

Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

name

  1. Formosa (name given to Taiwan island)

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

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

美麗島 · Mei3 li4 Dao3
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source line 88,129
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source record美麗島 美丽岛 [Mei3 li4 Dao3] /Formosa (from Ilha Formosa, "Beautiful Isle", the name given to Taiwan Island by passing Portuguese mariners in 1544)/