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長生不老

简长生不老 · 繁長生不老

Mandarin · pinyin cháng shēng bù lǎo

(idiom) to live forever and never grow old

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Characters in this entry

長: zhǎng · long; length; excel in; leader; Kangxi radical 168
生: shēng · life, living, lifetime; birth
不: bù · no, not; un-; negative prefix
老: lǎo · old, aged; experienced; Kangxi radical 125
长: zhǎng · long; length; excel in; leader

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

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Mandarin tones

2–1–4–3 · chang2 sheng1 bu4 lao3

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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.

長生不老 · find source passages ↗ · 长生不老 · find source passages ↗

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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 live forever and never grow old

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

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