Go-rip-mu-won

孤

외로울 고

立

설 립

無

없을 무

援

도울 원

Character by character

Meaning

Standing alone with no one to help — cut off on every side.

Origin

Not tied to a single classic; it appears across military treatises and histories. Its close cousin, “songs of Chu on four sides”, does come from one scene in the Shiji.

How it is used

Used of someone left without a single ally inside an organisation.

Hanja孤立無援

Simplified孤立无援

Korean reading고립무원

Pinyingū lì wú yuán

Frequently asked questions

Q. What does Go-rip-mu-won mean?

孤立無援 · Standing alone with no one to help — cut off on every side.

Q. Where does Go-rip-mu-won come from?

Not tied to a single classic; it appears across military treatises and histories. Its close cousin, “songs of Chu on four sides”, does come from one scene in the Shiji.

Q. How is Go-rip-mu-won used?

Used of someone left without a single ally inside an organisation.

Idioms in the same group

四面楚歌 Sa-myeon-cho-gaChu songs on all four sides — surrounded with nowhere to turn.進退兩難 Jin-toe-yang-nanHard to advance and hard to retreat.累卵之危 Nu-ran-ji-wiAs precarious as a stack of eggs.風前燈火 Pung-jeon-deung-hwaA lamp flame before the wind — an extremely precarious state.五里霧中 O-ri-mu-jungInside a fog five li deep — completely unable to make sense of things.緣木求魚 Yeon-mok-gu-eoClimbing a tree to look for fish — the method itself is wrong.

The idioms used in Korea mix phrases from the Chinese classics with ones coined in Korea. Where an expression is not used in China, the entry says so.