📖 Meaning
Describes clothing that is extremely tattered and covered in patches. The imagery comes from a quail's short, mottled feathers, which hang like a ragged garment, while "hundred knots" evokes a robe stitched together with countless patches. It is used to depict poverty and shabby, threadbare dress.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase appears in "Imitation Linked Pearls" (拟连珠) by Yu Xin (庾信), a celebrated writer of the Northern Zhou dynasty (北周), in the line "盖闻悬鹑百结，知命不忧" — one whose clothes hang ragged like a quail and are full of a hundred patches, yet who knows his fate, does not worry. The figure of a hanging quail for shabby clothes plays on the quail's short, dappled feathers resembling torn cloth, and is also traceable to Xunzi, who described the poor scholar Zixia as wearing clothes that "hung like a quail" (衣若县鹑). Over time the idiom came to stand for garments that are ragged and heavily patched.
💡 Example Usage
他虽然悬鹑百结，却依然乐观豁达，从不怨天尤人。
Although his clothes were ragged and full of patches, he remained optimistic and open-minded, never complaining about fate.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 悬鹑百结
- Pinyin: xuán chún bǎi jié
- Literal Translation: hanging quail, hundred knots
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4