羊质虎皮
yáng zhì hǔ pí
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
Traditional: 羊質虎皮
A sheep in a tiger's skin: impressive or fierce on the outside but weak and timid underneath. A bookish way to criticise a person or thing that is all show and no substance.
Chất dê mà khoác da hổ: bề ngoài oai vệ, dữ dằn nhưng thực chất yếu đuối, nhút nhát. Là cách nói sách vở để chê người hoặc vật chỉ có vẻ ngoài, không có thực lực.
Register: literary
Examples
Editorial example (illustrative, not a corpus attestation) — awaiting a native-speaker check
Sources & notes
Hán-Việt bridge batch 062 (2026-11-13). Headword, Traditional form and pinyin checked against CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0) source ↗ · Hán-Việt reading: Unihan kVietnamese source ↗ · Vietnamese cognate: Idiomer entry “dương chất hổ bì” (duong-chat-ho-bi). Definition, literal gloss and example sentence are original; the example has not had a native-speaker check yet.
Equivalents & related
Common questions
What does “羊质虎皮” mean?
A sheep in a tiger's skin: impressive or fierce on the outside but weak and timid underneath. A bookish way to criticise a person or thing that is all show and no substance. Literally: a sheep's substance, a tiger's skin
Is “羊质虎皮” formal or informal?
羊质虎皮 is generally literary.