📖 Meaning
Describes a state where one has exhausted all strategies and lacks the wit to devise new ones. It conveys being completely at one's wit's end, with no more ideas or resources to draw upon. The phrase emphasizes both the depletion of tactical options and the insufficiency of intellectual capacity.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom originates from the Yuan dynasty play "百花亭" (The Hundred Flowers Pavilion) by an anonymous author. In the play, the protagonist bemoans that he has grown so distressed over a woman named Miss He that his plans have run out and his wits have gone short. The phrase captures the moment when both strategic thinking and cleverness fail simultaneously. It has since entered common usage to describe anyone who has reached the limits of their resourcefulness.
💡 Example Usage
面对敌人的重重包围，将领已经计穷智短了。
Faced with the enemy's encirclement on all sides, the general had already run out of plans and wits.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 计穷智短
- Pinyin: jì qióng zhì duǎn
- Literal Translation: plan exhausted, wisdom short
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4