How to say "lit. having given away a bride, to lose one's army on top of it (idiom)" in Chinese

When To Use It

"lit. having given away a bride, to lose one's army on top of it (idiom)" maps to 赔了夫人又折兵 (péi le fū rén yòu zhé bīng), a neutral social phrase for communication situations.

Use it when you need to keep a conversation moving despite a language gap, unclear wording, or missing context.

Practice it first exactly as written, then swap in your own people, places, or objects so it becomes part of your active speaking repertoire.

Tone And Delivery

The register is neutral, which makes it flexible: safe in most daily situations without sounding stiff or overly intimate.

Because this is marked advanced, pay attention to nuance, tone, and whether a simpler phrase might be safer in fast conversation.

A good practice target is the example sentence 赔了夫人又折兵 (péi le fū rén yòu zhé bīng). Once that feels natural, shorten your pause and try it at conversation speed.

Practice Ideas

This phrase becomes more useful when you learn it as part of a mini-sequence. After saying it, a natural next step could be 唐太宗李卫公问对 (táng tài zōng lǐ wèi gōng wèn duì).

A second nearby phrase to review is 黄石公三略 (huáng shí gōng sān lüè), which helps you stay in the same topic instead of translating from scratch again.

• Read the example “lit. having given away a bride” aloud, then replace one detail with your own information.
• Pair it with “"Duke Li of Wei Answering Emperor Taizong of Tang", military treatise attributed to Li Jing 李靖[Li3 Jing4] and one of the Seven Military Classics of ancient China 武經七書|武经七书[Wu3 jing1 Qi1 shu1]” next so your conversation does not stop after a single line.
• Match the phrase to your tone of voice: soft for polite requests, flatter and quicker for routine daily use.
• If you hear a slightly different version in the wild, compare the tone and context before treating it as interchangeable.