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肝腦塗地

简肝脑涂地 · 繁肝腦塗地

Mandarin · pinyin gān nǎo tú dì

to offer one's life in sacrifice

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Characters in this entry

肝: gān · liver
腦: Look up this written character
塗: Look up this written character
地: de · dì · earth; soil, ground; region
脑: nǎo · brain
涂: tú · surname; name of certain rivers

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

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Mandarin tones

1–3–2–4 · gan1 nao3 tu2 di4

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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.

肝腦塗地 · find source passages ↗ · 肝脑涂地 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 2 senses · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

gon1 nou5 tou4 dei6

Cantonese word readings for 肝腦塗地. 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) to die a terrible death
(idiomatic) to offer one's life sacrificially in loyalty

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

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