千头万绪

千頭萬緒
qiāntóu-wànxù
idiom #42,861

Meanings

  1. 1 a thousand heads, ten thousand threads - extremely complicated
  2. 2 myriad loose ends; a tangled mess of tasks

Examples

HSK 3
Qiāntóu-wànxù de wèntí, bìxū yí jiàn yí jiàn jiějué.
Myriad complicated issues must be handled one at a time.
HSK 6
Suīrán gōngzuò qiāntóu-wànxù, dàn tā chǔlǐ de jǐngjǐng-yǒutiáo.
Though the work is extremely complex, she handles it in an orderly manner.
HSK 7-9
Bānjiā de shìqing qiāntóu-wànxù, wǒ dōu bùzhīdào cóng nǎli xiàshǒu.
The business of moving house is a thousand tangled threads - I don't even know where to start.

Tips

history
From Cao Zhi's Three Kingdoms-era essay 《自试令》: 千端万绪 - the variant with (ends) rather than (heads) is the earliest form. The metaphor is silk threads - originally means 'end of a silk thread' - implying many tangled strands to unwind.
memory
Picture a ball of yarn with a thousand ends sticking out. = 'thread-end' (the radical is 'silk'). Pull any one and more tangle up.

Stroke Order

qiān
tóu
wàn