指桑骂槐 — Chinese idiom
指桑骂槐
zhǐ sāng mà huái
Traditional: 指桑罵槐
Meaning
- lit. to point at the mulberry tree and curse the locust tree
- fig. to scold sb indirectly
- to make oblique accusations
Character by character
- 指zhǐfinger, toe; to point, to indicate
- 桑sāngmulberry tree; surname
- 骂màto accuse, to blame, to curse, to scold
- 槐huáilocust tree
Idioms sharing a character
- 一弹指顷 yī tán zhǐ qǐng
- 了如指掌 liǎo rú zhǐ zhǎng
- 令人发指 lìng rén fà zhǐ
- 如臂使指 rú bì shǐ zhǐ
- 屈指可数 qū zhǐ kě shǔ
- 弹指之间 tán zhǐ zhī jiān
- 指手画脚 zhǐ shǒu huà jiǎo
- 指日可待 zhǐ rì kě dài
- 指腹为婚 zhǐ fù wéi hūn
- 指鸡骂狗 zhǐ jī mà gǒu
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.