Oldie but not a goodie

The world's oldest recorded joke has been traced back to 1900 BC and suggests toilet humor was as popular with the ancients as it is today.

Actually, what it suggests is that ancient humor was staggeringly lame. The Reuters article continues:

It heads the world's oldest top 10 joke list published by the University of Wolverhampton Thursday.

A 1600 BC gag about a pharaoh, said to be King Snofru, comes second -- "How do you entertain a bored pharaoh? You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish."

The full list of ten is here, but I wonder if most of these should not have been categorized as jokes at all, but rather as examples of wit.

Posted by David on August 3, 2008 10:42 PM