千刀万剐

千刀萬剮

qiāndāo-wànguǎ

idiom #43,483

Meanings

1 to hack to pieces (former imperial punishment)
2 to be sliced a thousand times, describing crimes so heinous death cannot atone for them

Characters

to slice flesh from bone

Examples

HSK 4

这种叛徒千刀万剐也不为过。

Zhèzhǒng pàntú qiāndāo-wànguǎ yě bùwéiguò.

Even being sliced a thousand times wouldn't be enough for a traitor like this.

HSK 7-9

百姓恨不得把他千刀万剐。

Bǎixìng hènbude bǎ tā qiāndāo-wànguǎ.

The common people would happily have hacked him to pieces.

Tips

history

Refers to 凌迟 ('death by a thousand cuts'), an imperial-era execution method used for the most serious crimes such as treason and parricide. The phrase appears in the Yuan-dynasty drama 《盆儿鬼》 and was later popularized in Qing fiction. The actual punishment was abolished in 1905.

memory

千 (thousand) 刀 (knives) + 万 (ten thousand) 剐 (slice). Pure hyperbolic structure: '1,000 knives, 10,000 slices'. 剐 specifically means cutting flesh from bone.

Stroke Order

千 qiān

刀 dāo

万 wàn

剐 guǎ