This article attempts to trace the origin of the term guping in the Recent style verse and to define it. Guping. literally the "solitary level tone", refers not just to any solitary level tone in a line, but specifically to the solitary level tone in each of the two following standard tonal patterns: "level-level oblique-oblique-level" and "oblique-oblique-level-level obique-oblique-level". In each of these two lines, the second level tone becomes a guping if the first level tone is changed to oblique. In each of the two lines just mentioned, the replacement of the level tone in question by the oblique tone considerably reduces the tonal strength of the line and has been consciously avoided by poets since the mid-Tang. But it was not until about one thousand years later that a name, albeit a misleading one, was given to the solitary level tone in such an undesirable tonal arrangement. During the reign of Emperor Kangxi (r. 1644-1661) of the Qing dynasty, Wang Shizhen, in his "Lushi dingti", cautioned writers against the tonal arrangement of "oblique-level oblique-oblique-level" and "oblique/level-oblique-oblique-level oblique-obique-level". During the reign of Emperor Qianlong (r. 1736-1795), Li Ruxiang, in his book Guang Shengdiao pu, named the tonal arrangement of "oblique-level oblique-oblique-level" the "guping shi" (pattern containing a solitary level tone). Later, the seven-character tonal arrangement as cited by Wang was also considered a guping arrangement by writers of Recent Style verse. Without a clear understanding of the term guping, one might be led to think that any solitary level tone in any tonal arrangement in the Recent Style verse is a guping. It is this misconception, still being held in some academic circles , that this article seeks to remove.