📖 Meaning
Refers to severe interrogation carried out under brutal physical torture. The phrase depicts repeated beatings inflicted upon a suspect to force a confession, emphasizing the relentless and cruel nature of the questioning. It paints the image of someone being struck again and again during interrogation.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom has no single documented textual origin, but it arises from the long-standing practice of judicial torture in imperial China, where magistrates routinely used beating and flogging to extract confessions from suspects during legal proceedings. The 'ten...nine...' structure is a common Chinese rhetorical device used to stress frequency and near-completeness, here conveying that almost every interrogation was accompanied by a beating. It likely entered vernacular usage through popular legal dramas, vernacular fiction, and storytelling traditions rather than a specific classical source. No particular dynasty or historical figure is reliably associated with its coinage.
💡 Example Usage
官府对那书生十拷九棒，逼他供出同党的姓名。
The authorities subjected the scholar to relentless torture, forcing him to reveal the names of his accomplices.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 十拷九棒
- Pinyin: shí kǎo jiǔ bàng
- Literal Translation: ten, interrogate, nine, beat
- Category: Power
- Characters: 4