Idiom Explanation:
One arrow shoots two eagles. The metaphor is to do one thing to achieve two purposes.
Pronunciation:
一箭双雕
yī jiàn shuāng diāo
origin:
《北史·长孙晟传》：“尝有二雕飞而争肉，因以箭两只与晟，请射取之。晟驰往，遇雕相攫，遂一发双贯焉。”
story:
Changsun Sheng, called Ji Sheng, was a native of Luoyang during the Northern Zhou Dynasty of the North and South. He was intelligent and had military knowledge and skills, and was especially good at archery. So, at the age of 18, he became a military officer of the forbidden eastern palace.
At that time, Regent, the leader of the northern nomadic Turkic peoples, and the Northern Zhou sent envoys to and from each other. In order to show off their respective strengths, both sides chose brave and wise men to act as ambassadors, but the arrogant Regtou mostly despised the ambassadors sent by the Northern Zhou.
One year, the emperor of the Northern Zhou decided to marry a princess to Setu in order to further stabilize the Turkic Empire. In order to be safe, Changsun Sheng was sent to lead a group of generals to escort the princess to the Turkic provinces. After a lot of hardships, they finally arrived at Turkic. Regent made a big banquet. After three rounds of wine, according to the Turkic custom, they wanted to have a martial arts competition to celebrate. Regent ordered someone to bring a hard bow and asked Changsun Sheng to shoot a copper wire at a hundred paces. Hearing the sound of “Glele”, the hard bow was drawn into a curved moon, and a sharp arrow was shot into the small square hole of copper money with a “whoosh”. “Good!” Everyone applauded in unison. After seeing Changsun Sheng’s skills, Regent changed his contempt for the Northern Zhou emissary and asked Yuwen Shenqing to keep Changsun Sheng. Yuwen Shenqing agreed to Regent’s request, and Changsun Sheng thus stayed in Turkic. A year passed, Regent still let Changsun Sheng continue to follow his side, not to let him return to the Northern Zhou, and Regent every time he went hunting, always accompanied by Changsun Sheng.
One day, Regent saw two large eagles hovering in the air in front of the felt tent, fighting for a piece of meat. He called for Changsun Sheng with great interest and asked someone to take two arrows and hand them to Changsun Sheng, ordering him to shoot the two eagles down. Chang Sun Sheng took the arrows, quickly turned on his horse and sped away. He gradually got close to the eagle’s position, and he drew his bow and arrow, and shot through the chests of the two eagles with one arrow. The two eagles fell down together.
The idiom of “One Arrow, Two Eagles” evolved from this story.
Chang Sun Sheng’s superb archery skills won the applause of the Turkic soldiers present, and Regent was so happy that he ordered a heavy reward for Chang Sun Sheng and asked his men to learn archery from him. Later, Yang Jian seized the power of the Northern Zhou Dynasty and established the Sui Dynasty. Turkic and other minority countries took the opportunity to attack the Sui dynasty to take revenge for the Northern Zhou. By this time, Changsun Sheng had returned to the Sui Dynasty. With his wisdom and bravery and his knowledge of the internal situation of Turkic countries, he helped Yang Jian to repel Turkic invasions many times.
Changsun Sheng had four sons and one daughter. His son, Changsun Wuji, was a famous minister during the Zhenguan period of the Tang Dynasty. The youngest daughter of Changsun Sheng was later married to the future Emperor Taizong Li Shimin, who was the famous Empress Changsun.
Similar Idioms:
一石二鸟
一举两得
