郑人买履 — Chinese idiom
郑人买履
zhèng rén mǎi lǚ
Traditional: 鄭人買履
Meaning
- (lit.) the person from Zheng 郑 (Zhèng) who wanted to buy shoes (an allusion to an ancient story about somebody who, when buying a pair of shoes, preferred to rely on their foot measurements rather than just trying them on)
- (fig.) disregarding the sensible approach in favor of adherence to a fixed idea
Character by character
- 郑zhèngstate in today's Henan; surname
- 人rénman, person; people
- 买mǎito buy, to purchase; to bribe, to persuade
- 履lǚshoes; to walk, to tread
Idioms sharing a character
- 郑人争年 Zhèng rén zhēng nián
- 一鸣惊人 yī míng jīng rén
- 三人成虎 sān rén chéng hǔ
- 不可告人 bù kě gào rén
- 不恤人言 bù xù rén yán
- 不甘人后 bù gān rén hòu
- 不甘后人 bù gān hòu rén
- 不近人情 bù jìn rén qíng
- 乘人不备 chéng rén bù bèi
- 事在人为 shì zài rén wéi
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.