January 27: Wedding Month

The ancient Greeks were seafaring people, so ropes and knots were part of daily life. They particularly favoured the reef knot, which they referred to as “Hercules knot”, for its strength (and simplicity, maybe?) You know: Right over left, left over right, makes a knot both tidy and tight. Besides its practical use, it has been a recurring theme in jewelry and art. For the Romans, the Herculean knot was a symbol for love and marriage, hence the expression “tying the knot”. And since we’re talking knots, let’s mention that other famous example, the Gordian one. In the 4th Century BC, Alexander the Great entered the city of Gordium, where a legendary king had tied an ox-cart to a temple post, with an intricate knot. The oracle had declared that whoever could unravel it, would become king of all of Asia. Alexander either meticulously untied it, or dramatically “cut the Gordian knot”. History shows that only the second version made it into common knowledge. Which says more about common knowledge than about Alexander.