Fun With Chinese Animal Names
an interactive post
by Joe Váradi
Many familiar animal varieties, like those of the Chinese zodiac (8 out of 12 of which are pictured above), are designated by a single Chinese character. But it’s with the less common animal names that the Chinese language gets really creative.
See if you can guess these, based on the literal translations into English. The solutions are given further down below. These are ordered from the intuitive to the progressively less obvious.
This will be fun, trust me.
- 斑馬 — “striped horse”
- 長頸鹿 — “long neck deer”
- 食蟻獸 — “eat ant beast”
- 龍蝦 — “dragon shrimp”
- 海獅 — “sea lion” (don’t overthink this one)
- 海象 — “sea elephant”
- 海豹 — “sea leopard”
- 海豚 — “sea piglet”
- 松鼠 — “pine rat”
- 栗鼠 — “chestnut rat”
- 袋鼠 — “pouch rat”
- 壁虎 — “wall tiger”
- 臭鼬 — “stinky weasel”
- 熊貓 — “bear cat”
- 無尾熊 — “bear with no tail”
- 貓頭鷹 — “cat-headed eagle”
- 鬣狗 — “dog with horse’s mane”
- 企鵝 — “goose on tiptoes” (my personal favorite)
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ok let’s see how you did … scroll down for the answers
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- 斑馬 — “striped horse” → ZEBRA
- 長頸鹿 — “long neck deer” → GIRAFFE
- 食蟻獸 — “eat ant beast” → ANTEATER
- 龍蝦 — “dragon shrimp” → LOBSTER
- 海獅 — “sea lion” → SEA LION
- 海象 — “sea elephant” → WALRUS
- 海豹 — “sea leopard” → SEAL
- 海豚 — “sea piglet” → DOLPHIN
- 松鼠 — “pine rat” → SQUIRREL
- 栗鼠 — “chestnut rat” → CHIPMUNK
- 袋鼠 — “pouch rat” → KANGAROO
- 壁虎 — “wall tiger” → GECKO, HOUSE LIZARD
- 臭鼬 — “stinky weasel” → SKUNK
- 熊貓 — “bear cat” → PANDA
- 無尾熊 — “bear with no tail” → KOALA
- 貓頭鷹 — “cat-headed eagle” → OWL
- 鬣狗 — “dog with horse’s mane” → HYENA
- 企鵝 — “goose on tiptoes” → PENGUIN
Gianina Buda, best of luck with your new publication! I am so glad that a home on Medium exists now for aficionados of language learning.