I was reading a journal article today that said, "...none has succeeded in cutting through the Gordian knot at the heart of the system". Hmmmm! And I thought had learned so much from this board. Looking it up, I found it to be a Greek legend, and I found the following:

"Gordian knot, an intricate knot tied by Gordius in the thong which connected the pole of the chariot with the yoke. An oracle having declared that he who should untie it should be master of Asia, Alexander the Great averted the ill omen of his inability to loosen it by cutting it with his sword. Hence, a Gordian knot is an inextricable difficulty; and to cut the Gordian knot is to remove a difficulty by bold and energetic measures."

I love it and will use it again and again. Are there other terms from legends that you enjoy using?

An interesting thing about this phrase is that in Greek the wording is "to untie the Gordian knot" which is not what Alexander the Great did. I think it's typical of how Greeks often bypass the method and only concentrate on the end result (which IS What Alexander did!)

I am so glad that you pointed that out, museamuse, because I had wondered about that. I thought I was just being too "literal". However, from reading about the term, it sounded like the toughness was in untying the knot, not in the strength of the material. Yet, Alexander cut the knot because he couldn't untie it. I wonder if anyone ever untied it?

Sidebar to CJ: Ah, CJ, can your knives cut a Gordian Knot? What a wonderful ad campaign, "Our Knives Can Cut Gordian Knots!" Do I get a commission?

Odd you should bring up this topic since it came up in a conversation with my sister just yesterday. The word was "tantalize" and, after using it, I had asked her if she had ever heard the story about that word's background.

Going just by memory (meaning I'm too lazy at the moment to google it out) there was a Greek (??) myth (or legend?) about a man named Tantalus (a king, maybe? Greek myths seem to be crawling with them.) who somehow managed to piss off the gods. Don't recall just how he accomplished this but mortals were always smarting off to the gods in one way or another.

As a punishment, they put him into a clear, blue lake under the bough of a huge tree from which grew all manner of fruit. They did this with grafting, I suppose. The kicker was that every time Tantalus raised his hand to pick a piece of fruit, the branch would pull away from him thereby keeping the fruit just beyond his reach. If this were a modern day group of smart-ass vengeful gods, they'd make it pizza or candy bars, but you get the idea.

Similarly, if Tantalus lowered his head to take a sip from the cool, clear lake, the water level would drop in the same manner as to always the lips of poor ol' Tantalus dry. The hydrolic logistics involved must have cost the gods a pretty penny but that just goes to show you to what lengths they'll go to when someone needs to be smacked down. When I first heard this story as a kid, I wondered why Tantalus didn't just cup his hands to bring the needed H2O to his mouth but I assume the gods had this covered somehow. Astoundingly rapid vaporation, maybe.

Anywho, from "Tantalus" we get the word "tantalize" meaning to hold out something valuable to someone in such a way as they'll never get it.

(I hope you've been taking notes. We're due for a pop quiz.)

(And wouldn't that make a great name for an elderly teacher: "Pop Quiz"?)

(...but I digress.)

Interesting, CJ. I tried wordnerd's Onelook link; I hadn't used Onelook before, and I now love it. I found this about "tantalize":

"[fr. L Tantalus a Phrygian king who for his crimes was condemned to remain in Tartarus, standing, thirsty and hungry, chin-deep in water with fruit-laden branches hanging above his head; whenever he tried to drink the water level would recede, and when he tried to eat the fruit would rise out of reach] : to tease or torment by presenting something desirable to view but keeping it continually out of reach."

For some reason I couldn't get this to link to the site; it was from the Etymological Dictionary.

Reviving a very old thread...

You don't tend to think of sports pages as using "Gordian knot." At least here in the U.S. sportswriters are about the least erudite of all newspaper people. However, I saw this in the sports page of the Tribune:

"...few teams have faced the Gordian knot that the Lakers do. There is no way to retain both O'Neal and free-agent Kobe Bryant."

Nice use of the phrase!