Chinese symbol for “stragglers”

散兵

sǎn bīng

loose and disorganized soldiers; stragglers; fig. a loner

The closest CC-CEDICT match for stragglers is 散兵 (sǎn bīng), defined as: loose and disorganized soldiers; stragglers; fig. a loner.

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

散 sǎn

to scatter, to disperse, to break up

radical 66 ⽁ · 12 strokes

兵 bīng

soldier; troops, an army; warlike

radical 12 ⼋ · 7 strokes

Related words

Other words that share a character with 散兵.

Word	Pinyin	Meaning
扩散 (擴散)	kuò sàn	to spread; to proliferate; to diffuse
分散	fēn sàn	to scatter; to disperse
解散	jiě sàn	to dissolve; to disband
散发 (散發)	sàn fā	to distribute; to emit; to give off
散布 (散佈)	sàn bù	to disseminate
散文	sǎn wén	(broadly) prose (as opposed to verse); (more narrowly) free-form literary prose, such as essays, sketches and reflections
士兵	shì bīng	soldier; 个 (gè)
步兵	bù bīng	infantry; foot

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.