📖 Meaning
Literally describing lines running vertically and horizontally and interpenetrating one another. It depicts a crisscrossing, densely intertwined arrangement, such as paths, rivers, or strokes. By extension it characterizes a situation or relationship that is highly complex and tangled.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase traces to Volume One of 东莱博议 (Donglai Boyi) by the Southern Song dynasty scholar Lü Zuqian (吕祖谦). In the passage, Lü writes of those who kept company with Zhu Si (朱泗) at his gatherings, saying that all which entered their ears were words of virtue, crisscrossing in profusion. The wording there is 纵横交错, from which the variant 纵横交贯 later developed. The Qing dynasty scholar Ji Yun (纪昀) employed it in 阅微草堂笔记, describing a talisman in 万法归宗 whose strokes crisscrossed in a manner resembling small seal script.
💡 Example Usage
地图上纵横交贯的铁路线，把全国各大城市紧紧连成了一体。
The crisscrossing railway lines on the map tightly linked all the country's major cities into a single whole.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 纵横交贯
- Pinyin: zòng héng jiāo guàn
- Literal Translation: vertical and horizontal, intersect, penetrate through
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4