So this Bronze Age hunter-gatherer walks into a bar...

I don't have long, but this needed to be shared.

Yahoo News reported today on a British study that traced the World's Ten Oldest Jokes. The full list, spanning about 2,300 years, is here, though I'm not sure if the ones by Odysseus and Oedipus (#4 and 5) really count.

Anyway, the ancient Sumerians, founders of the first civilization, also came up with this knee-slapper of a proverb around 1900 BC:

"Something which has never occurred since time immemorial;
a young woman did not fart in her husband's lap."

That joke is literally as old as the Pyramids. Sadly, it still sounds newer than most of my Dad's material.

The second oldest joke, according to the study, comes from Egypt a full 400 years before Moses:

Q: How do you entertain a bored pharaoh?

A: You sail a boatload of young women dressed only in fishing nets down the Nile and urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish.

Charming. I guess we can at least credit the Egyptians with inventing the traditional question-and-answer format.

Last but not least, we have the first recorded joke in English, courtesy of the 10th Century:

Q: What hangs at a man's thigh and wants to poke the hole that it's often poked before?
A: A key.

That is by far the best joke on the list. Hooray for modern comedy.

Come to think of it, the Greek playwright Aristophanes wrote several comedies that are older (and considerably funnier) than half the stuff on that list. And let's not forget the ever-popular Proverbs 26:11, which is a few hundred years older than him. Hey, if the Sumerian wife farting in her husband's lap makes the cut, so should that.

And of course, let's not forget the vital contributions of Comicus, the first Stand-up Philosopher:

WARNING: the following video contains a bit of colorful language.
Please watch only when small children and/or employers are out of earshot.

Bea Arthur. Outstanding.