con có cha như nhà có nóc, con không cha như nòng nọc đứt đuôi
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
Meaning · English
A child with a father is a house with a roof; without, a tadpole with its tail snapped off — shelter and its absence, in one image.
Literally: with father: roofed house; fatherless: tail-snapped tadpole
Examples
Con có cha như nhà có nóc, mất cha rồi mới thấm.A father is the roof of the house — you feel it only once he's gone.
Editorial example (VI sweep batch 040, illustrative)
Sources & notes
Discovered via Vietnamese Wikiquote (CC BY-SA 4.0); retrieved 2026-08-01. Source: source ↗ Definition is an original editorial synthesis, not copied from the source.
Common questions
What does “con có cha như nhà có nóc, con không cha như nòng nọc đứt đuôi” mean?
A child with a father is a house with a roof; without, a tadpole with its tail snapped off — shelter and its absence, in one image. Literally: with father: roofed house; fatherless: tail-snapped tadpole
Is “con có cha như nhà có nóc, con không cha như nòng nọc đứt đuôi” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.