







山鸡映水 is a Chinese idiom (chengyu) meaning “to admire oneself”. To be engrossed in one's own appearance or performance; self-appreciation, often implying a degree of vanity. Literally, “Pheasant reflects in water”.
During the Three Kingdoms period, someone from the south caught a beautiful pheasant and presented it to Cao Cao.
Cao Cao was fond of the pheasant and ordered his subordinates to make it dance. However, they didn't understand the pheasant's habits, and no matter how they coaxed it, the bird would not dance.
The clever Cao Chong then had a large mirror brought in. He placed the pheasant in front of the mirror, and seeing its own reflection, the pheasant began to dance enthusiastically.
Cao Cao was greatly pleased.

Choose character parts and animate their colors, together or in stroke order
Open the tool →
Chinese and English fill-in vocabulary worksheets
Open the tool →
Turn a Chinese character or sentence into a GIF or MP4
Open the tool →
Printable tracing sheets with a QR learning companion
Open the tool →山鸡映水 (shān jī yìng shuǐ) is a Chinese idiom (chengyu) meaning “to admire oneself”.
山鸡映水 is pronounced shān jī yìng shuǐ in Mandarin Chinese.
Literally, 山鸡映水 means “Pheasant reflects in water”. It is used to mean “to admire oneself”.
山鸡映水 comes from a classical Chinese story dating back to ancient China. The full story is on this page.
山鸡映水起舞。比喻自我欣赏