泥古不化 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• conservative and unable to adapt

Character by character

• 泥nìmud, earth, clay; plaster, paste
• 古gǔold, classic, ancient
• 不bùno, not, un-; negative prefix
• 化huàto change, to convert, to reform; -ize

Idioms sharing a character

• 判若云泥 pàn ruò yún ní
• 拖泥带水 tuō ní dài shuǐ
• 泥沙俱下 ní shā jù xià
• 泥牛入海 ní niú rù hǎi
• 烂醉如泥 làn zuì rú ní
• 雪泥鸿爪 xuě ní hóng zhǎo
• 云泥之别 yún ní zhī bié
• 亘古不变 gèn gǔ bù biàn
• 人心不古 rén xīn bù gǔ
• 借古讽今 jiè gǔ fěng jīn

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.