côi

Đứa trẻ mồ côi ngồi một mình trên chiếc xích đu.

Definitions

1. Adjective:
   • Orphaned, parentless: Describes a person, especially a child, who has lost one or both parents.
   • Solitary, lone: Can describe something that stands alone, isolated, or without its usual pair or group, often evoking a sense of sadness or abandonment.

Usage Examples

• Adjective:
  • Đứa trẻ mồ côi đó rất đáng thương. (That orphaned child is very pitiful.)
  • Nó sống một cuộc đời côi cút sau khi gia đình qua đời. (He lives a solitary, abandoned life after his family passed away.)
  • Chiếc giày côi nằm một mình trên đường. (The lone shoe lay by itself on the road.)

Advanced Usage

• "côi cút": An alliterative compound (từ láy) that intensifies the meaning, conveying a profound sense of being orphaned, lonely, and helpless.
  • Bà cụ sống côi cút trong căn nhà nhỏ. (The old woman lives utterly alone in a small house.)

Variants and Related Words

• Mồ côi (adj/n): The most common and standard term for "orphaned" or "orphan." While côi is the root, mồ côi is the full, widely used form.

  • trại trẻ mồ côi (orphanage)
  • đứa trẻ mồ côi cha (a child who has lost their father)

• Cô đơn (adj): Lonely, solitary. Shares the connotation of being alone but is more general and less specific to parental loss than côi.

• Lẻ loi (adj): Isolated, all alone. Similar to in describing solitary existence.

Synonyms

• Orphaned: (of a child) deprived of parents.
• Parentless: having no living parents.
• Solitary: done or existing alone.

Related Idioms and Phrases

• Côi cút một mình: To be all alone, utterly solitary.
  • Ông ấy côi cút một mình trong căn nhà cũ. (He is all by himself, utterly alone, in the old house.)
• Sống đời côi cút: To live a life of loneliness and abandonment.
  • Không con cái, họ sợ sẽ sống đời côi cút về già. (With no children, they fear they will live a lonely, abandoned life in old age.)