📖 Meaning
Literally, to die of old age in the main room of one's own traditional house, a peaceful and natural death at a ripe old age. In modern usage it is mostly a metaphor for the demise, collapse, or final end of a thing, institution, or system. It often carries a faintly formal or slightly ironic tone.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase comes from the Ming dynasty vernacular novel Investiture of the Gods (封神演义) by Xu Zhonglin, chapter 11. The tyrant King Zhou (纣王), last ruler of the Shang dynasty, is rebuking a minister who had predicted the king would come to a bad end while boasting that he himself would die peacefully of old age at home. The king flings the words back: 'You say I will not die a good death, yet you boast you will shòu zhōng zhèng qǐn — is this not insulting your sovereign?' The original sense of dying a natural death at a great age was later generalized to the demise of anything.
💡 Example Usage
这家百年老店终因经营不善，寿终正寝了。
In the end, this century-old shop closed its doors for good due to mismanagement.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 寿终正寝
- Pinyin: shòu zhōng zhèng qǐn
- Literal Translation: long life, end, main, bedroom
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4