贪官污吏 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• grasping officials, corrupt mandarins ; abuse and corruption

Character by character

• 贪tāngreedy, covetous; corrupt
• 官guānofficial, public servant
• 污wūfilthy, dirty; polluted, impure
• 吏lìgovernment official, magistrate

Idioms sharing a character

• 好酒贪杯 hào jiǔ tān bēi
• 桀贪骜诈 jié tān ào zhà
• 贪天之功 tān tiān zhī gōng
• 贪婪无厌 tān lán wú yàn
• 贪小失大 tān xiǎo shī dà
• 贪得无厌 tān dé wú yàn
• 贪心不足 tān xīn bù zú
• 贪求无厌 tān qiú wú yàn
• 贪污腐化 tān wū fǔ huà
• 贪猥无厌 tān wěi wú yàn

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