King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “gutless”

胆小如鼠
dǎn xiǎo rú shǔ
Traditional: 膽小如鼠
(idiom) chicken-hearted; gutless

The closest CC-CEDICT match for gutless is 胆小如鼠 (dǎn xiǎo rú shǔ), defined as: (idiom) chicken-hearted; gutless.

Before using these characters for a tattoo, check them with a native speaker. Dictionary words often have several meanings, and the right choice depends on context.

Characters and stroke order

胆 dǎn
gallbladder; gall, guts, courage
radical 130 ⾁ · 9 strokes
小 xiǎo
small, tiny, insignificant
radical 42 ⼩ · 3 strokes
如 rú
as, as if, like, such as, supposing
radical 38 ⼥ · 6 strokes
鼠 shǔ
rat, mouse
radical 208 ⿏ · 13 strokes

Traditional forms

Related words

Other words that share a character with 胆小如鼠.

WordPinyinMeaning
大胆 (大膽)dà dǎnbrazen; audacious
胆子 (膽子)dǎn zicourage; nerve
胆小 (膽小)dǎn xiǎocowardice; timid
胆敢 (膽敢)dǎn gǎnto dare (negative connotation); to have the audacity to (do sth)
胆量 (膽量)dǎn liàngcourage; boldness
胆固醇 (膽固醇)dǎn gù chúncholesterol
小时 (小時)xiǎo shíhour
小说 (小說)xiǎo shuōnovel; fiction
如果rú guǒif; in case; in the event that
老鼠lǎo shǔrat; mouse (只 (zhī))

See also: Japanese symbol for “gutless”.

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3); Make Me a Hanzi (Arphic Public License (graphics.txt); LGPL-3.0-or-later (dictionary.txt)); wordfreq (CC BY-SA 4.0 (data)). Retrieved 2026-10-22.