Situations
雪上加霜
설상가상
xuě shàng jiā shuāng
Seol-sang-ga-sang
雪
눈 설
上
위 상
加
더할 가
霜
서리 상
Character by character
Meaning
Frost on top of snow — one misfortune stacked on another.
Origin
Found in Chan Buddhist records such as the Blue Cliff Record.
How it is used
Said when bad things happen back to back.
Hanja雪上加霜
Simplified雪上加霜
Korean reading설상가상
Pinyinxuě shàng jiā shuāng
Frequently asked questions
Q. What does Seol-sang-ga-sang mean?
雪上加霜 · Frost on top of snow — one misfortune stacked on another.
Q. Where does Seol-sang-ga-sang come from?
Found in Chan Buddhist records such as the Blue Cliff Record.
Q. How is Seol-sang-ga-sang used?
Said when bad things happen back to back.
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.轉禍爲福 Jeon-hwa-wi-bokDisaster turned into good fortune.
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.