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Tang Dynasty Jueju Du Mu

Red Cliff

赤壁

Chì bì

A broken weapon prompts an imagined alternative to a famous battle. See how wind, political power, and two women's possible fate become one sharp question.

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Read the original and its translation together. Open a line’s word meanings for a closer look.

About the text and pronunciation

The simplified view changes character forms, not the edition. Notes and sources retain the cited text.

The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.

Word by word, in the order of the line. A gloss is a crib. It is not the translation.

01

折戟沉沙鐵未銷，

zhé jǐ chén shā tiě wèi xiāo

A broken halberd lies in sand, its iron not yet gone;

Word meanings — Line 1
  1. 折 zhé broken
  2. 戟 jǐ halberd
  3. 沉 chén sunk
  4. 沙 shā sand
  5. 鐵 tiě iron
  6. 未 wèi not yet
  7. 銷 xiāo worn away
02

自將磨洗認前朝。

zì jiāng mó xǐ rèn qián cháo

I take it, scrub it clean, and recognize an earlier age.

Word meanings — Line 2
  1. 自 zì myself
  2. 將 jiāng take
  3. 磨 mó polish
  4. 洗 xǐ wash
  5. 認 rèn recognize
  6. 前 qián former
  7. 朝 cháo dynasty
03

東風不與周郎便，

dōng fēng bù yǔ zhōu láng biàn

Had the east wind not favored young Lord Zhou,

Word meanings — Line 3
  1. 東 dōng east
  2. 風 fēng wind
  3. 不 bù not
  4. 與 yǔ give
  5. 周 zhōu Zhou
  6. 郎 láng young lord
  7. 便 biàn advantage
04

銅雀春深鎖二喬。

tóng què chūn shēn suǒ èr qiáo

deep spring at Bronze Sparrow Terrace would have held the two Qiaos captive.

Word meanings — Line 4
  1. 銅 tóng bronze
  2. 雀 què sparrow
  3. 春 chūn spring
  4. 深 shēn deep
  5. 鎖 suǒ locks
  6. 二 èr two
  7. 喬 qiáo Qiao

English translation by PoemWell.

Read the whole poem

Original

折戟沉沙鐵未銷，

自將磨洗認前朝。

東風不與周郎便，

銅雀春深鎖二喬。

Translation

A broken halberd lies in sand, its iron not yet gone;

I take it, scrub it clean, and recognize an earlier age.

Had the east wind not favored young Lord Zhou,

deep spring at Bronze Sparrow Terrace would have held the two Qiaos captive.

Try it from memory

After reading, recall the underlined word or phrase in each line. Say its meaning before opening the answer. These prompts use the text edition printed above.

  1. Line 1 · What does the marked word mean?

    折戟沉沙鐵未銷，

    Pronunciation hint

    shā

    Reveal meaning and translation

    沙 — sand

    A broken halberd lies in sand, its iron not yet gone;

  2. Line 3 · What does the marked word mean?

    東風不與周郎便，

    Pronunciation hint

    yǔ

    Reveal meaning and translation

    與 — give

    Had the east wind not favored young Lord Zhou,

  3. Line 4 · What does the marked word mean?

    銅雀春深鎖二喬。

    Pronunciation hint

    shēn

    Reveal meaning and translation

    深 — deep

    deep spring at Bronze Sparrow Terrace would have held the two Qiaos captive.

One more question: what changes?

Compare the opening and closing lines. What changes in the scene, the speaker’s attention, or the feeling? Choose a Chinese word as evidence, then compare your reading with the notes. More than one answer may be reasonable.

Line-by-line notes →

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Line-by-line notes

Lines 1–2: history recognized through an object

折戟 gives us a damaged halberd. 未銷 says the iron has survived enough to be cleaned. 自將磨洗 makes recognition follow a hand’s work, taking and scrubbing the weapon. 前朝 comes into the poem through this act. The English carries the sequence from material in the sand to a person recognizing something older.

Lines 3–4: a history the poet imagines could have happened

不與周郎便 sets a condition: suppose the east wind had not given Zhou Yu an advantage. The English “had” and “would” make that imagined alternative clear across two lines. 二喬 are the two Qiao sisters, and Bronze Sparrow Terrace evokes Cao Cao’s power in this imagined victory. 鎖 turns the consequence into captivity for particular people. The still, deep spring of the final line is part of that counterfactual, not a report of an actual imprisonment.

Form and tone

This seven-character jueju turns sharply between the second and third lines: an object from the past prompts an unreal alternative past. The final line offers a scene instead of spelling out a strategic conclusion. That compression is the source of its provocative historical argument.

See jueju for the larger formal pattern. Pinyin gives modern Mandarin pronunciation; a historical level/oblique grid is not inferred from those modern tones.

Historical context

The title invokes the battle of Red Cliff, long before Du Mu’s lifetime. The poem’s encounter with a relic should be read as its literary premise, not as a verified archaeological discovery. Compare Mount Xisai for another poet’s account of how southern power came to an end.

Continue with Du Mu and the memory reading path. Compare Thinking of the Past at Mount Xisai and Jia Yi using the reading connections below.

Sources

赤壁 — Chinese text. Checked against the linked Wikisource transcription. The displayed traditional text follows this reading. Punctuation and line breaks are editorial. Translation, glosses, and reading notes are original to PoemWell.

English translation, gloss, and notes by PoemWell. The translation is original to this site.

The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.

Updated .

Cite this reading

Du Mu. “Red Cliff” (赤壁). PoemWell. English translation by PoemWell. Updated .

https://poemwell.org/poems/red-cliff-du-mu

Credit the poet for the Chinese original and PoemWell for this translation and commentary. Use the permanent page link above; source editions are listed separately.