三纲五常 — Chinese idiom
三纲五常
sān gāng wǔ cháng
Traditional: 三綱五常
Meaning
- three principles and five virtues
- the three rules (ruler guides subject, father guides son and husband guides wife) and five constant virtues of Confucianism (benevolence 仁, righteousness 義|义, propriety 禮|礼, wisdom 智 and fidelity 信)
Character by character
- 三sānthree
- 纲gāngprogram, outline; principle, guiding thread
- 五wǔfive; surname
- 常chángcommon, general, normal; always, frequently, regul
Idioms sharing a character
- 一唱三叹 yī chàng sān tàn
- 一日三秋 yī rì sān qiū
- 一板三眼 yī bǎn sān yǎn
- 三下两下 sān xià liǎng xià
- 三五成群 sān wǔ chéng qún
- 三人成虎 sān rén chéng hǔ
- 三令五申 sān lìng wǔ shēn
- 三天两头 sān tiān liǎng tóu
- 三妻四妾 sān qī sì qiè
- 三姑六婆 sān gū liù pó
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.