名落孙山 — Chinese idiom
名落孙山
míng luò Sūn Shān
Traditional: 名落孫山
Meaning
- lit. to fall behind Sun Shan 孙山 (Sūn Shān) (who came last in the imperial examination)
- fig. to fail an exam
- to fall behind (in a competition)
Character by character
- 名míngname; position, rank, title
- 落luòto fall, to drop; surplus, net income
- 孙Sūngrandchild, descendent; surname
- 山Shānmountain, hill, peak
Idioms sharing a character
- 一举成名 yī jǔ chéng míng
- 久仰大名 jiǔ yǎng dà míng
- 人如其名 rén rú qí míng
- 冒名顶替 mào míng dǐng tì
- 功名利禄 gōng míng lì lù
- 功成名就 gōng chéng míng jiù
- 名不副实 míng bù fù shí
- 名不符实 míng bù fú shí
- 名不虚传 míng bù xū chuán
- 名利双收 míng lì shuāng shōu
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.