📖 Meaning
To weigh and measure with extreme precision, down to the smallest unit. It describes someone who scrutinizes or calculates things in a highly meticulous and minute fashion, leaving no detail unexamined.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom originates from a letter by the Ming dynasty scholar Tang Shunzhi (唐顺之), titled 'Letter to Wang Longxi' (与王龙溪郎中书). In the letter, Tang questions why someone who professed to delight in the Way of Yao and Shun would nonetheless weigh and measure everything so meticulously in the smallest matters of giving and receiving, behaving like a petty-minded person. The phrase uses 'zhu' (an ancient tiny weight unit) and 'cun' (an inch) to metaphorically convey extreme precision in reckoning.
💡 Example Usage
财务审计时，他对每一笔账目都铢称寸量，绝不放过任何差错。
During the financial audit, he weighed and measured every single entry with meticulous precision, refusing to overlook any discrepancy.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 铢称寸量
- Pinyin: zhū chēng cùn liáng
- Literal Translation: zhu weigh, inch measure
- Category: Method
- Characters: 4