📖 Meaning
To put something outside one's consideration, disregarding personal safety, gain, or loss. It describes a mindset where one sets aside one's own interests, life, or death and acts without concern for personal consequences.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase originates from the 'Book of Later Han' (后汉书), in the biography of Wei Xiao (隗嚣). After years of exhausting warfare, Emperor Guangwu of Han considered that Wei Xiao's son was serving as a hostage at court while Gongsun Shu held a distant border region. The emperor told his generals to set these two rivals aside and not worry about them for the time being. Over time, the expression came to mean disregarding personal life and death, or setting aside one's own interests for a greater cause.
💡 Example Usage
为了抢险救灾，消防员早已将个人安危置之度外。
To carry out the rescue, the firefighters had long set aside their own safety.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 置之度外
- Pinyin: zhì zhī dù wài
- Literal Translation: place, it, consideration, outside
- Category: Attitude
- Characters: 4