Chinese symbol for “horrendous”
惨不忍睹
cǎn bù rěn dǔ
Traditional: 慘不忍睹
lit. so horrible that one cannot bear to look (idiom); fig. miserable; horrendous; atrocious
The closest CC-CEDICT match for horrendous is 惨不忍睹 (cǎn bù rěn dǔ), defined as: lit. so horrible that one cannot bear to look (idiom); fig. miserable; horrendous; atrocious.
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
Traditional forms
Related words
Other words that share a character with 惨不忍睹.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 悲惨 (悲慘) | bēi cǎn | miserable; tragic |
| 惨案 (慘案) | cǎn àn | massacre; tragedy |
| 惨重 (慘重) | cǎn zhòng | disastrous |
| 惨遭 (慘遭) | cǎn zāo | to suffer (defeat, death etc) |
| 惨败 (慘敗) | cǎn bài | to suffer a crushing defeat |
| 惨烈 (慘烈) | cǎn liè | bitter; desperate |
| 不是 | bù shì | no; is not |
| 不能 | bù néng | cannot; must not |
| 忍不住 | rěn bu zhù | cannot help; unable to bear |
| 目睹 | mù dǔ | to witness; to see at first hand |
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.