What 鼀 means
It names a toad, especially a slow, land-dwelling kind. Its graph combines 黽, a component associated with amphibians, and 圥, which hints at the sound. A traditional gloss ties the name to the toad’s call, rough skin, and slow movement.
The Erya, an early Chinese dictionary, transmits the spelling 鼁𪓰, but commentators debate whether its first character should be 鼀. The Shuowen Jiezi, an early dictionary that explains character forms, analyzes 鼀 directly. Later, the Bencao Gangmu, a Chinese book on medicinal substances, distinguishes this slow land toad from the smaller, jumping frog. Older sources also use 圥鼀 and 䗇鼀; 𪓰 and 䵸 are variant graphs. The historical name 戚施 later also referred figuratively to a hunchback or a flatterer. 蟾蜍 became the ordinary Chinese word for a toad.
How do I type 鼀?
Enter GCRXU in the Cangjie Chinese input method. If the character does not appear in the candidate list, a rare-character filter may be hiding it.
In modern Chinese, 鼀 gives a toad reference a distinctly literary, old-fashioned tone.
If it arrives alone, read it as a literal toad reference; context must supply any other meaning.
Who writes 鼀
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Related characters
4
Questions people ask
1Why does 鼀 show as a box on some devices?
Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.
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9
How to type or find 鼀
- Also called
- 蟾蜍 · 蟾蠩 · 圥鼀
- Search it as
- cù · cu4 · toad · rare Chinese character · Cangjie
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
鼀\9F00Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.