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落井下石

Mandarin · pinyin luò jǐng xià shí

to throw stones at sb who has fallen down a well (idiom)
to hit a person when he's down

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Characters in this entry

落: luò · fall, drop; net income, surplus
井: jǐng · well, mine shaft, pit; surname; 22nd lunar mansion, determinative star μ Geminorum (Tejat); hexagram ䷯
下: xià · under, underneath, below; down; inferior; bring down
石: shí · stone, rock, mineral; Kangxi radical 112

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

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Mandarin tones

4–3–4–2 · luo4 jing3 xia4 shi2

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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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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

lok6 zeng2 haa6 sek6

Cantonese word readings for 落井下石. 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 kick someone when they are down

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

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