Historic Data

We can trace the term “Gordian knot,” commonly used to describe a complex or unsolvable problem, back to a legendary chapter in Alexander the Great‘s life.As the story goes, in 333 B.C. the Macedonian conqueror marched his army into the Phrygian capital of Gordium in modern day Turkey. Upon arriving in the city, Alexander discovered an ancient wagon with a yoke tied by knots so tightly entangled that a Roman historian later described them as “impossible to see how they were fastened”.

Phrygian tradition held that the wagon had once belonged to Gordius, the father of the celebrated King Midas. An oracle declared that whoever could unravel its elaborate knots would be the ruler all of Asia.

Ancient chronicler Arrian wrote that the impulsive Alexander immediately yearned, “seized with an ardent desire”, to untie the Gordian knot. After wrestling with it for a time and finding no success, he stepped back from the mass of gnarled ropes. Then he proclaimed, “It makes no difference how they are loosed”. He then drew his sword and sliced the knot in half with a single stroke.

There is another version of the legend. He simply pulled out a lynchpin running through the yoke, loosening the knot enough that he was able to unfasten it. People immediately hailed the young king for outsmarting the ancient puzzle, regardless of the method he used. A thunder and lightning storm shook Gordium that same night. As a result, Alexander and his men took is as a sign that he had pleased the gods. In other words, it was interpreted it as a divine approval. True to the prophecy, he went on to conquer Egypt and large swaths of Asia before his death. Alexander died at the age of 32.

Guild Naming

A few words on how we came up with this name.
The guild was founded by eleven World of Warcraft players. We’ve been raiding together under another banner and due to fundamental differences we have decided to create our own team. After creating our discord server we arranged to run a poll to decide on the guild’s name. The were a few candidates for the name but the top two were “Gordian Knot” and “50 Shades of Wipe”. As all of the founders were greek, we ended up having as top result “Gordian Knot”. Above all, this has a deep meaning for our guild as it implies the tightness, purpose and culture of it.
You can discover more about our guild here.