土牛木马 / 土牛木馬

tǔ​niú​mù​mǎ

something useless

(idiom) clay ox and wooden horse; something that has the appearance of the real thing but lacks its substance or practical utility

土 (literal) → 土 · tǔ · soil 牛 (literal) → 牛 · niú · ox 木 (literal) → 木 · mù · wood 马 (literal) → 马/馬 · mǎ · horse

Changed: simplified, traditional, gloss, definition, pinyin, variant pinyin, variants, separable parts, decomposition

created sense May 20, 2026, 07:57 PM