0:00:02 > 0:00:04A man comes home after work and he says to his wife,
0:00:04 > 0:00:06"Here, I've just met the butcher. And he tells me he's made love
0:00:06 > 0:00:09"to every single woman in our street except one."
0:00:09 > 0:00:13"Well," she says, "that'll be that stuck-up cow at number 21."
0:00:13 > 0:00:15Well, it's a tough choice, but I have to say,
0:00:15 > 0:00:17that's one of my all-time favourite gags.
0:00:17 > 0:00:20It belongs to Max Miller and it's probably 60 years old.
0:00:20 > 0:00:22But it still makes me laugh.
0:00:27 > 0:00:31Please forgive me, I'm very tired. I've been shoplifting.
0:00:31 > 0:00:34And some of those shops are very heavy, I'll tell you!
0:00:38 > 0:00:42Sir! This slave you have sold me has just died.
0:00:42 > 0:00:45My God! He never did such a thing when he belonged to me.
0:00:45 > 0:00:48'In fact, is there such a thing as a new joke?
0:00:48 > 0:00:52'I look at what made the Romans roar and what tickled the Tudors.'
0:00:52 > 0:00:56There's a lot of jockeying for social position in telling a joke.
0:00:56 > 0:00:58I've got a friend who's got a butler whose left arm is missing.
0:00:58 > 0:01:00Serves him right.
0:01:00 > 0:01:01In ancient Greece, for instance,
0:01:01 > 0:01:06there was a joke club in which people would exchange jokes.
0:01:06 > 0:01:09Morning, Socrates!
0:01:09 > 0:01:10Morning, Plato!
0:01:10 > 0:01:12- There's a lot to offend if you're not very...- Not very PC?
0:01:12 > 0:01:13No, no, no, no.
0:01:16 > 0:01:19We're here to see whether old jokes can be funny.
0:01:19 > 0:01:22I've been advertising for a wife but I've had 500 replies,
0:01:22 > 0:01:25all from married men, offering me theirs.
0:01:25 > 0:01:28There is no such thing as an old joke,
0:01:28 > 0:01:31only jokes that people have heard before.
0:01:31 > 0:01:34Do jokes pass across the centuries as easily as they travel
0:01:34 > 0:01:36around the internet?
0:01:36 > 0:01:40I intend to find out, as I go in search of the world's oldest joke.
0:01:54 > 0:01:58'Wisecrack, gag, quip, jape, jest, pun.
0:01:58 > 0:02:01'Call it what you like, sharing a joke is one of the most effective
0:02:01 > 0:02:07'ways we bond with our fellow human beings. But how do we define a joke?
0:02:07 > 0:02:10'For me, there's one man who can answer that question better
0:02:10 > 0:02:11'than anyone else.'
0:02:11 > 0:02:13What is a joke?
0:02:13 > 0:02:16Ah! A joke!
0:02:16 > 0:02:18Well, there are many different kinds of jokes.
0:02:18 > 0:02:23If you look in the dictionary, a joke will tell you a joke is a jest,
0:02:23 > 0:02:26a device to make people laugh.
0:02:26 > 0:02:28Are there any accountants in the audience?
0:02:30 > 0:02:34There's one! What's black and brown and looks good on an accountant?
0:02:34 > 0:02:36A Rottweiler.
0:02:37 > 0:02:41If you look way, way back to the origins of the word "joke",
0:02:41 > 0:02:44you'll find that in Old English,
0:02:44 > 0:02:47it really meant a trinket, a jewel.
0:02:47 > 0:02:50So my grandad used to say to me, "Mike, don't watch your money.
0:02:50 > 0:02:51"Watch your health."
0:02:51 > 0:02:55And one day, whilst I was watching my health, someone stole my money.
0:02:57 > 0:02:58It was my grandad.
0:03:00 > 0:03:03To me, a joke is like a very expensive watch.
0:03:03 > 0:03:06Can I have a look at yours, please? Yes.
0:03:06 > 0:03:10Gosh! Gosh!
0:03:10 > 0:03:12If you take an expensive watch
0:03:12 > 0:03:15and just very carefully lift the back off, you'll see the mechanism,
0:03:15 > 0:03:20all little balances and wheels and timings. And that's what a joke is.
0:03:20 > 0:03:24That's why a joke has to be very carefully used.
0:03:24 > 0:03:27Two cannibals in the jungle, having lunch together.
0:03:27 > 0:03:29One says to the other one, "I don't like your wife."
0:03:29 > 0:03:33And the other one says, "Well, just eat the chips, then."
0:03:33 > 0:03:37It can be a story, it can be an anecdote, it can be a rhyme,
0:03:37 > 0:03:40it can be a jingle. It's like saying the word "music".
0:03:40 > 0:03:42There are all different kinds of music,
0:03:42 > 0:03:43there's all different kinds of jokes.
0:03:43 > 0:03:44What's this?
0:03:44 > 0:03:47SHE BARKS
0:03:47 > 0:03:48I don't know. What is that?
0:03:48 > 0:03:49A vicious circle.
0:03:51 > 0:03:54- Why do we need to laugh? - It's happiness.
0:03:54 > 0:03:57As you go through life, we're all searching for happiness.
0:03:59 > 0:04:00It's a treasure.
0:04:00 > 0:04:04It's a treasure that we all try to find, happiness, pleasure.
0:04:04 > 0:04:07Pleasure and happiness are not quite the same thing,
0:04:07 > 0:04:09but happiness is more important.
0:04:09 > 0:04:13Happiness brings with it contentment and satisfaction.
0:04:13 > 0:04:16And jokes can satisfy that need?
0:04:16 > 0:04:20Jokes are really tickling the mind. Tickling the mind.
0:04:20 > 0:04:22A polar bear walks into a bar and says to the barman,
0:04:22 > 0:04:24"How much for a pint of bitter?"
0:04:24 > 0:04:27And the barman says to him, "Well, that'll be £6, please."
0:04:27 > 0:04:30And the polar bear says, "Well, how much for a glass of house red wine?"
0:04:30 > 0:04:31And the barman says, "Well, that'll be £9."
0:04:31 > 0:04:33"And what about a vodka, lime and lemonade?"
0:04:33 > 0:04:35And the barman says, "Well, that'll be £13.50."
0:04:35 > 0:04:36The barman says to him,
0:04:36 > 0:04:39"I hope you don't mind, but we don't often get polar bears in here."
0:04:39 > 0:04:41And the polar bear says, "Well, at these prices,
0:04:41 > 0:04:44"I'm not bloody surprised."
0:04:44 > 0:04:47When you stand on a stage and you actually tell a joke
0:04:47 > 0:04:50and an audience laughs, that's a wonderful feeling.
0:04:50 > 0:04:52It's a wonderful, fabulous feeling.
0:04:52 > 0:04:55It's the same feeling that people get when they tell a friend a joke.
0:04:55 > 0:05:00- What cheese do you use to hoax a bear from a tree?- I don't know.
0:05:00 > 0:05:01"Camem-bear."
0:05:03 > 0:05:05They're asking for affection, they're asking for love,
0:05:05 > 0:05:10they're asking for appreciation. And that's what entertainers do.
0:05:10 > 0:05:11That's what comedians do.
0:05:11 > 0:05:13A fella went into the police station
0:05:13 > 0:05:15and said he'd been robbed by an elephant.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18And the police sergeant said, "Was it an Indian elephant
0:05:18 > 0:05:22"with little ears or was it an African elephant with big ears?"
0:05:22 > 0:05:25He said, "I don't know. It had a stocking over its head."
0:05:25 > 0:05:30- Can we learn from the joke books of the past?- Oh, I think so. Yes.
0:05:30 > 0:05:33I once got permission to visit and spend some time in
0:05:33 > 0:05:35the Bodleian Library in Oxford
0:05:35 > 0:05:39cos I was so... I wanted to know, what is a laugh?
0:05:39 > 0:05:45Why do people laugh? How can you create laughter? What is a joke?
0:05:45 > 0:05:49I wanted to know this. So I read all the books I could.
0:05:50 > 0:05:54- I read some fabulous... - Going back how far?
0:05:54 > 0:05:57Oh, as far as the library had books on it.
0:05:57 > 0:05:59Sigmund Freud wrote a book called
0:05:59 > 0:06:03Jokes And Their Relation To The Unconscious.
0:06:03 > 0:06:06The trouble is that Freud never played second house,
0:06:06 > 0:06:08Friday night in Glasgow Empire.
0:06:09 > 0:06:13This poor traffic warden, you know, he popped his clogs.
0:06:13 > 0:06:16Stepped off, the traffic warden. And they had him all boxed up.
0:06:16 > 0:06:21And they were loading him into the whole and suddenly, he came to life.
0:06:21 > 0:06:25He came to life! And he knocked on the lid. And they rose him up again.
0:06:25 > 0:06:29And they open the lid, and he sat up. He said, "I'm alive! I'm alive!"
0:06:29 > 0:06:32The vicar said, "I'm sorry, sir. I've started the paperwork."
0:06:38 > 0:06:41'Nowadays, you can find a joke about any subject.
0:06:41 > 0:06:43'That wasn't always the case.
0:06:43 > 0:06:48'In 1949, the BBC issued the Green Book, which laid out
0:06:48 > 0:06:52'strict rules on what was and wasn't acceptable to joke about.'
0:06:52 > 0:06:55There's an absolute ban on the following: lavatories,
0:06:55 > 0:06:57effeminacy in men, immorality of any kind,
0:06:57 > 0:07:01suggestive references to honeymoon couples, chambermaids,
0:07:01 > 0:07:06fig leaves, prostitution, ladies' underwear, e.g. winter draws on,
0:07:06 > 0:07:11animal habits, e.g. rabbits, lodgers, commercial travellers.
0:07:11 > 0:07:15And extreme care should be taken in dealing with references to,
0:07:15 > 0:07:18or jokes about, prenatal influences,
0:07:18 > 0:07:21e.g. his mother was frightened by a donkey.
0:07:26 > 0:07:28To find out how much jokes have changed
0:07:28 > 0:07:31since that infamous Green Book, I've come to see my old friend,
0:07:31 > 0:07:34Barry Cryer, joke teller and joke writer.
0:07:36 > 0:07:39- Over the years, do you hear the same jokes coming round?- Oh, yes.
0:07:39 > 0:07:41- Decade after decade? - The names change.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46A joke with a name in it will always be used as a formula.
0:07:46 > 0:07:51I remember, back in the '60s, saying about Harold Wilson,
0:07:51 > 0:07:54if he fell off a cliff, he'd swear he was going up.
0:07:54 > 0:07:58This is just a formula line, but I've used it about Tony Blair...
0:07:58 > 0:08:00- Nick Clegg?- Nick Clegg.
0:08:00 > 0:08:03- How do you save George Osborne from drowning?- I don't know. How do you?
0:08:03 > 0:08:04Take your foot off his head.
0:08:06 > 0:08:11Are old jokes just being re-clothed,
0:08:11 > 0:08:15re-dressed up as new with new references, contemporary
0:08:15 > 0:08:19references, but the jokes, the basic joke is centuries old?
0:08:19 > 0:08:24All good jokes answer to the form, set it up, set the scene,
0:08:24 > 0:08:29something happens during the scene and it ends with a surprise.
0:08:29 > 0:08:31They want us to write that down!
0:08:31 > 0:08:34A judge, who stopped a case stone cold in the middle of the afternoon,
0:08:34 > 0:08:37apologised to the council and the jury and the witnesses
0:08:37 > 0:08:39and said, "We've got to adjourn until tomorrow.
0:08:39 > 0:08:42"I've left my notes on this case in a file at home in the country."
0:08:42 > 0:08:44And one of the council stood up and said, "Fax it up, my lord."
0:08:44 > 0:08:48He said, "Yes, it does rather, doesn't it?" We move on.
0:08:48 > 0:08:54- Some jokes endure, some don't. - Yes.- Why?
0:08:54 > 0:08:57Some of the best jokes are timeless, they're just about human nature.
0:08:57 > 0:09:01Some jokes just go away because they're about pounds, shillings
0:09:01 > 0:09:04and pence, or a topical theme at the time.
0:09:04 > 0:09:07But the really great jokes are just about human nature,
0:09:07 > 0:09:09so you can keep telling them.
0:09:09 > 0:09:10Bloke's been on a night out.
0:09:10 > 0:09:12He's so drunk he's thrown up all over himself.
0:09:12 > 0:09:15He's like, "Oh, what am I going to do?" His mate says, "Don't worry.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18"Listen, when you go home to the wife, stick 20 quid in your pocket,
0:09:18 > 0:09:21"say someone else threw up on you, yeah?
0:09:21 > 0:09:23"And they've given you 20 quid for the dry cleaning."
0:09:23 > 0:09:26Bloke's like, "Brilliant!" Goes home, walks in.
0:09:26 > 0:09:29Wife goes, "You've thrown up!" He's like, "No, no, look.
0:09:29 > 0:09:32"Someone threw up on me and they've given me £20 for the dry cleaning."
0:09:32 > 0:09:35She goes, "But why is there £40 there?"
0:09:35 > 0:09:38He goes, "The other £20 is from the guy who shit in my pants."
0:09:41 > 0:09:42'In the 1960s,
0:09:42 > 0:09:46'a new kind of comedian arrived to rival the traditional joke tellers.'
0:09:46 > 0:09:51Do you know what they call a tall, suave, sophisticated,
0:09:51 > 0:09:54coloured, highly-educated university professor with three
0:09:54 > 0:09:57degrees in nuclear physics in Alabama?
0:09:57 > 0:09:58Nigger.
0:09:59 > 0:10:03'Jokes became less formulaic and more political.
0:10:03 > 0:10:07'With the emergence of alternative comedy in the 1980s,
0:10:07 > 0:10:10'joke telling was firmly out of fashion.'
0:10:10 > 0:10:12We still have the same government.
0:10:12 > 0:10:14Even though we had an election, we have the same government.
0:10:14 > 0:10:17Mrs Thatcher stormed Parliament for the third time.
0:10:17 > 0:10:18We'd better be careful.
0:10:18 > 0:10:20If she wins it again, they're going to have to let her keep it.
0:10:20 > 0:10:22Jokes remained in real life. They always will do.
0:10:22 > 0:10:24But I think it was suddenly regarded as...
0:10:24 > 0:10:28Not suddenly, gradually regarded as rather old-fashioned, telling jokes.
0:10:28 > 0:10:30And then there was a great breed of performers who just
0:10:30 > 0:10:32talked about life and did routines about life.
0:10:32 > 0:10:34And people thought, "Oh, this is refreshing."
0:10:34 > 0:10:37Being Scottish, a lot of people think I'm a drunk.
0:10:39 > 0:10:41And this is nonsense.
0:10:41 > 0:10:44I just do drunk impersonations, you know,
0:10:44 > 0:10:47to make people feel cosy wosy in the company of a Scotsman, you know?
0:10:47 > 0:10:48And it's quite easy.
0:10:48 > 0:10:53Scotsmen, drunk Scotsmen, especially drunk Glaswegians,
0:10:53 > 0:10:55walk with one leg, like that.
0:10:59 > 0:11:03People writing their own material, it was all part of a change.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06Seachange was happening around that time.
0:11:06 > 0:11:08And they ask everybody if they're all right all the time.
0:11:09 > 0:11:10You all right?
0:11:13 > 0:11:15Yeah, I'm all right. Who's talking to you?
0:11:18 > 0:11:22'On a personal level, jokes travel from text to e-mail to dinner party,
0:11:22 > 0:11:24'and we neither know nor care who wrote them,
0:11:24 > 0:11:26'as long as they're funny.
0:11:26 > 0:11:28'Until the middle of the 20th century,
0:11:28 > 0:11:32'this was also true for professional comics, who would lift jokes,
0:11:32 > 0:11:34'and even whole routines, from their peers.'
0:11:34 > 0:11:37Now, ladies and gentlemen, you might have heard this joke told before,
0:11:37 > 0:11:40but not as beautifully as I do it.
0:11:40 > 0:11:42'However, with the introduction of television
0:11:42 > 0:11:43'and dedicated comedy clubs,
0:11:43 > 0:11:46'a joke became irrevocably associated
0:11:46 > 0:11:48'with the first person to tell it.
0:11:48 > 0:11:50'I've come to see Tim Vine for a modern comedian's
0:11:50 > 0:11:52'thoughts on the subject.'
0:11:52 > 0:11:55How many jokes do you actually know, and how many have you written,
0:11:55 > 0:12:00- do you think?- Well, that's a good question. I've probably written...
0:12:01 > 0:12:04..I don't know, maybe a couple of thousand or something.
0:12:04 > 0:12:07Robin Hood came up to me. I said, "Where do you keep your arrows?"
0:12:07 > 0:12:10He said, "In a quiver." I said, "Where do you keep your arrows?"
0:12:10 > 0:12:12All these gags that you've given birth to,
0:12:12 > 0:12:15if you hear another comedian making a living, telling your material,
0:12:15 > 0:12:18don't you get really angry?
0:12:18 > 0:12:21When I was doing clubs, you were in a situation where you're more
0:12:21 > 0:12:25vulnerable in that situation because someone could...
0:12:25 > 0:12:27And it's happened, and it's very real, I think.
0:12:27 > 0:12:31People from established comics have sat at the back,
0:12:31 > 0:12:34writers for established comics, have sat at the back of this room
0:12:34 > 0:12:37with a notepad and written down what some of these comics have said.
0:12:37 > 0:12:40And then, the comics here, you know, will be watching telly one night
0:12:40 > 0:12:43and suddenly discover someone doing it on the Royal Variety Show.
0:12:43 > 0:12:46So that sort of thing, you know, naturally is going to...
0:12:46 > 0:12:48- Upset you?- Yes. Yeah, yeah.
0:12:48 > 0:12:51You see, the advantage of easy origami is twofold.
0:12:54 > 0:12:56With me, I had... There was an e-mail that went round, saying,
0:12:56 > 0:12:58"These are Tommy Cooper jokes."
0:12:58 > 0:13:02And it was a section of my act. And they weren't Tommy Cooper jokes.
0:13:02 > 0:13:04- They were your originals?- They were mine. I'd written them, yeah.
0:13:04 > 0:13:07And this thing, this e-mail, because everyone loves Tommy, rightly,
0:13:07 > 0:13:09it got very popular.
0:13:09 > 0:13:11But at the time, me working on the circuit,
0:13:11 > 0:13:13whenever I got to that patch, there was a period,
0:13:13 > 0:13:14a couple of years, when I got to that patch,
0:13:14 > 0:13:17I would occasionally hear someone going, "That's a Tommy Cooper joke."
0:13:17 > 0:13:20In a situation like that, when you're on the stage and
0:13:20 > 0:13:22you hear someone in the front, you want to go,
0:13:22 > 0:13:23"No, it's not! I wrote it!"
0:13:23 > 0:13:25You don't want to break out of your silly persona.
0:13:25 > 0:13:27Today, I had dinner with my boss and his wife,
0:13:27 > 0:13:29and it was a complete disaster. My boss's wife said to me,
0:13:29 > 0:13:32"Tim, how many potatoes would you like?" "I'll just have one."
0:13:32 > 0:13:34"All right, you don't have to be polite."
0:13:34 > 0:13:37I said, "All right, then. I'll just have one, you stupid cow!"
0:13:37 > 0:13:40Once you've told a joke, it gets into the public domain,
0:13:40 > 0:13:43do people kind of forget where it comes from?
0:13:43 > 0:13:45Do they come and tell you your own jokes back to you
0:13:45 > 0:13:47when you're in the supermarket or wherever?
0:13:47 > 0:13:49I have had that a couple of times, yeah. Yeah.
0:13:49 > 0:13:53I think a taxi driver once said to me, "What do you think of this?
0:13:53 > 0:13:55"You know all male tennis players are witches?
0:13:55 > 0:13:58"For example, Goran, even he's a witch." And I said, "Oh, yeah. Yeah."
0:13:58 > 0:14:01I don't think I had the heart to tell him that I made it up, actually.
0:14:01 > 0:14:03I think I left it. I just said, "That's very funny."
0:14:03 > 0:14:06So I was working in a health food shop. This bloke walked in.
0:14:06 > 0:14:09He said, "Evening, primrose oil." I said, "Mr Vine to you."
0:14:20 > 0:14:23One of the heroes of modern joke telling is Robert Orben,
0:14:23 > 0:14:26a man who offered all his jokes up for public consumption
0:14:26 > 0:14:29and saw them used by all the great comics of the day.
0:14:29 > 0:14:32Well worth travelling 3,500 miles to meet him.
0:14:36 > 0:14:40- Your jokes are quite short. - That's right, one-liners.- One-liners.
0:14:40 > 0:14:44But that was not very popular through the years.
0:14:44 > 0:14:50It's really the fast pace of living that has brought about one-liners.
0:14:50 > 0:14:51A book fell on my head.
0:14:51 > 0:14:53I only have my shelf to blame.
0:14:55 > 0:14:58When you were writing these books, you were just writing jokes,
0:14:58 > 0:15:00and everybody would take them and adapt them,
0:15:00 > 0:15:03- find the ones that suited their personality.- Absolutely.
0:15:03 > 0:15:06So what I'm interested in is how,
0:15:06 > 0:15:10in a room with a blank sheet of paper, you sit down
0:15:10 > 0:15:11and you're disciplined and you say,
0:15:11 > 0:15:13"I'm going to write three jokes today."
0:15:13 > 0:15:17For most of my writing life,
0:15:17 > 0:15:21I wrote 25 jokes a day, seven days a week.
0:15:21 > 0:15:25And then, pared it down to what I thought was the funniest.
0:15:25 > 0:15:27I take my children everywhere.
0:15:27 > 0:15:30Unfortunately, they find their way home.
0:15:30 > 0:15:31In those earlier days,
0:15:31 > 0:15:35where you were working professionally as a gag writer,
0:15:35 > 0:15:39the pressure not to write jokes about certain subjects,
0:15:39 > 0:15:43did that come from the audience, from the advertisers?
0:15:43 > 0:15:47Were people just afraid of the reaction or that was just
0:15:47 > 0:15:52- the culture at the time?- The general culture, and that has changed.
0:15:52 > 0:15:55And I want to say that the Johnsons they are lovely people.
0:15:55 > 0:15:57I'm very fond of them, particularly Mrs Johnson.
0:15:57 > 0:16:03She's so jolly and fat, she's two of the finest women I ever saw.
0:16:03 > 0:16:04To show you how fat she is,
0:16:04 > 0:16:08she fell down one day and rocked herself to sleep, trying to get up.
0:16:08 > 0:16:11Sexist jokes no longer work.
0:16:12 > 0:16:18Women now will boo a comedian who starts getting involved with
0:16:18 > 0:16:20sexist material.
0:16:20 > 0:16:22I used to call my girlfriend Melancholy Baby
0:16:22 > 0:16:25because she had a head like a melon and a face like a collie.
0:16:28 > 0:16:32That was not acceptable. Now, it's totally not acceptable.
0:16:32 > 0:16:34- Do you cringe when you... - Oh, yes. Yes.
0:16:34 > 0:16:40At one point, we were putting together a Doubleday book that
0:16:40 > 0:16:44sort of mashed together four of my other books.
0:16:44 > 0:16:50And out of 9,000 jokes that I went through...
0:16:51 > 0:16:55I threw out 2,000 as being sexist.
0:16:55 > 0:16:57I beat my wife up this morning.
0:16:57 > 0:16:59I got up at seven, she got up at eight.
0:17:06 > 0:17:08Should we talk about clowns?
0:17:09 > 0:17:10Cheers.
0:17:12 > 0:17:15'For as long as civilisation has existed, the comedian, too,
0:17:15 > 0:17:19'has existed in the form of a joker, a jester or clown.
0:17:19 > 0:17:23'Ancient Native Americans believed that only by laughing could
0:17:23 > 0:17:24'you contact the gods,
0:17:24 > 0:17:28'so clowns were present at all religious ceremonies.
0:17:28 > 0:17:31'At the Battle of Hastings, William the Conqueror's joker was
0:17:31 > 0:17:33'the first man to be killed.
0:17:33 > 0:17:35'He was sent out in front of the troops to provoke
0:17:35 > 0:17:36'the English into attack.
0:17:38 > 0:17:41'Possibly the first comic to die a death, literally.
0:17:41 > 0:17:43'Even in Victorian times,
0:17:43 > 0:17:46'a clown was equally at home on a stage as in a circus.
0:17:46 > 0:17:50'Dr Ann Featherstone recently discovered Victorian clown
0:17:50 > 0:17:53'Thomas Lawrence's gag book, a fascinating
0:17:53 > 0:17:57'and rare example of a 19th-century jokesmith's catalogue of works.'
0:18:00 > 0:18:02What this discovery shows is the incredible
0:18:02 > 0:18:06importance of the joke book to the comedian.
0:18:06 > 0:18:08When Bob Monkhouse's joke books were stolen,
0:18:08 > 0:18:13he offered a reward of £10,000 for the return of what he called
0:18:13 > 0:18:15his precious babies,
0:18:15 > 0:18:18and that was a hell of a lot of money in those days.
0:18:18 > 0:18:22Now, Ann, I can see you trembling here. You're very excited.
0:18:22 > 0:18:24What is it you've got for us?
0:18:24 > 0:18:29- I have in my hand a Victorian clown's gag book.- A clown's gag book?
0:18:29 > 0:18:31Why does a clown need a gag book?
0:18:31 > 0:18:34Clowns are physical comedians, they're not verbal.
0:18:34 > 0:18:40Ah, well, in the 19th century, a clown could be a singing,
0:18:40 > 0:18:43talking, as well as a physical clown.
0:18:43 > 0:18:48If William Penn's aunts had a pie shop, how much would the pies cost?
0:18:48 > 0:18:50The "pie-rates" of "Penn's Aunts".
0:18:53 > 0:18:55- So clowns did jokes?- Yes.
0:18:55 > 0:18:57I suspect, correct me if I'm wrong,
0:18:57 > 0:19:00what you've got here, with Lawrence and his ilk,
0:19:00 > 0:19:03- is the origins of the stand-up comedian.- Yes.
0:19:03 > 0:19:06What's the difference between a rowing boat and Joan of Arc?
0:19:06 > 0:19:09One's made of wood, the other's "Maid of Orleans".
0:19:10 > 0:19:14This is the copy that he has at the side of the ring
0:19:14 > 0:19:18and flips through really quickly. He knows where the material is.
0:19:18 > 0:19:21And this is just full of material, comedy material?
0:19:21 > 0:19:24Comedy material, what a clown would call wheezes.
0:19:24 > 0:19:26Marriage is like bathing in cold water.
0:19:26 > 0:19:28One plunge and it's all over.
0:19:28 > 0:19:30Is any of it still funny, do you think?
0:19:30 > 0:19:34- There were certain things which Victorians found funny.- Like?
0:19:34 > 0:19:40Like marriage, love, misfortune
0:19:40 > 0:19:45and women, women in all shapes and sizes.
0:19:45 > 0:19:47You know, I'm very fond of the ladies.
0:19:47 > 0:19:49I say bless those wives that fill our lives
0:19:49 > 0:19:51With little bees and honey
0:19:51 > 0:19:54They ease life's shocks they mend our socks
0:19:54 > 0:19:56But can't they spend the money?
0:19:59 > 0:20:03There may be as many groans as laughs.
0:20:03 > 0:20:06But you went to the circus to hear the same stuff.
0:20:06 > 0:20:11You weren't really going there to hear novelty, to hear new jokes.
0:20:11 > 0:20:13- Actually, you were quite happy to hear...- The familiar?
0:20:13 > 0:20:16The familiar ones, over and over and over again.
0:20:16 > 0:20:18Bad husbands are like bad coals.
0:20:18 > 0:20:22They smoke, they go out and they don't keep the pot boiling.
0:20:22 > 0:20:24These audiences were Victorian.
0:20:24 > 0:20:30You think immediately of prudish, very po-faced, very retentive.
0:20:30 > 0:20:34- So you'd expect the material to be very prim and proper.- Mm.
0:20:34 > 0:20:35No, not really.
0:20:35 > 0:20:37- There's a lot to offend if you're not careful.- Not very PC?
0:20:37 > 0:20:39No, no, no, no. No, no.
0:20:39 > 0:20:44We've got a wheeze that he calls Blacksmith's Daughter,
0:20:44 > 0:20:48- which is quite a misogynistic piece. - Was that typical of the period?
0:20:48 > 0:20:52Oh, yes. He says, "She's an uncommon sort of girl.
0:20:52 > 0:20:56"There was a neatness in her style of dress. Did you notice the bonnet?
0:20:56 > 0:20:58"Wasn't it a little duck?"
0:20:58 > 0:20:59I gave her that.
0:20:59 > 0:21:01"Then her boots. Did you see them?"
0:21:01 > 0:21:02I gave her that.
0:21:02 > 0:21:07"And her jacket. Did you take notice of that? Wasn't it a beauty?"
0:21:07 > 0:21:08I gave her that.
0:21:08 > 0:21:11"And her eyes. You must have noticed them.
0:21:11 > 0:21:15"Yes, they were black," says the ringmaster. "Yes."
0:21:15 > 0:21:16I gave her those.
0:21:19 > 0:21:23- That would... I guess would raise a laugh.- I'm sure it would, yes.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26But we might find it a bit awkward these days.
0:21:29 > 0:21:30'As well as a love of wordplay
0:21:30 > 0:21:34'and a rather dubious attitude towards women, Victorian jokes also
0:21:34 > 0:21:38'revealed concerns about new advances in industry.'
0:21:38 > 0:21:39Did you hear today about the accident?
0:21:39 > 0:21:43Three men run over by a train? They were saved by a miracle.
0:21:43 > 0:21:46The train was going over a bridge and they were going under it.
0:21:48 > 0:21:52'And, of course, the creation of a police force in 1829 gave them
0:21:52 > 0:21:54'a whole new target.'
0:21:54 > 0:21:55Policeman are like rainbows.
0:21:55 > 0:21:57They never appear until a storm is over.
0:22:01 > 0:22:04You obviously know the material that's in here.
0:22:04 > 0:22:07Do you ever hear it, if you watch television or see a movie or
0:22:07 > 0:22:10go to a show or something, and say, "Wow!
0:22:10 > 0:22:14- "I can see that gag coming from Thomas Lawrence's book"?- Yes.
0:22:14 > 0:22:17- Can you give us an example? - Absolutely.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20There's one called Tragedy. And I think, if you listen to it,
0:22:20 > 0:22:25you realise that you've heard this, in a sense, before,
0:22:25 > 0:22:27- but in a more modern context.- OK.
0:22:27 > 0:22:30So we have to imagine that Tom is in the middle of the ring,
0:22:30 > 0:22:34and he's got to fill, probably, two minutes.
0:22:34 > 0:22:36And maybe it's a restless audience.
0:22:36 > 0:22:39So he needs to do something really dramatic.
0:22:39 > 0:22:43So he says, "Thou rememberest well, the night was dark
0:22:43 > 0:22:47"and tempestuous when a sudden and terrific storm broke o'er our heads."
0:22:47 > 0:22:49I just happened to glance at the night sky,
0:22:49 > 0:22:52and I marvelled at the millions of stars glistening like pieces
0:22:52 > 0:22:55of quicksilver thrown carelessly onto black velvet.
0:22:55 > 0:22:57"The rain fell in torrents,
0:22:57 > 0:23:01"the forked lightning flashed through the murky skies, the horrid artillery
0:23:01 > 0:23:06"of heaven rolled as if it were about to burst the fiery element."
0:23:06 > 0:23:09In awe, I watched the waxen moon ride across the zenith
0:23:09 > 0:23:12of the heavens like an amber chariot towards the ebony void
0:23:12 > 0:23:14of infinite space, wherein the tethered bolts...
0:23:16 > 0:23:21..of Jupiter and Mars hang for ever, festooned in their orbital majesty.
0:23:21 > 0:23:24"All nature seemed as though chaos was come again,
0:23:24 > 0:23:26"when a voice, a giant's voice,
0:23:26 > 0:23:29"was heard above the roaring of the waters,
0:23:29 > 0:23:32"a voice that sounded from East to West, from North to South,
0:23:32 > 0:23:35"from hill to hill, from cataract to cavern.
0:23:35 > 0:23:38"A voice proclaimed aloud to the affrighted world..."
0:23:38 > 0:23:41"I must put a roof on this lavatory."
0:23:41 > 0:23:44"Have you got a clean shirt for Sunday?"
0:23:44 > 0:23:45HE LAUGHS
0:23:45 > 0:23:48Very well done! Well done. Very good.
0:23:50 > 0:23:53'What Thomas Lawrence's joke book highlights is that jokes often
0:23:53 > 0:23:55'rely on social context,
0:23:55 > 0:23:59'so what was funny to one generation is distinctly unfunny to the next.'
0:23:59 > 0:24:03For example, the ancient Greeks liked nothing more
0:24:03 > 0:24:06than a good lettuce gag. Not many gems there.
0:24:06 > 0:24:08But how do you make one of those very old jokes
0:24:08 > 0:24:10funny for today's audience?
0:24:10 > 0:24:14Is it in the actual words or is it in the way I tell them?
0:24:18 > 0:24:21I've come to Canterbury to meet Oliver Double,
0:24:21 > 0:24:24who teaches historical performance and comedy.
0:24:24 > 0:24:28- Nice to see you.- Good to see you. Got any new jokes for us.
0:24:28 > 0:24:31We're going to join one of his classes as they attempt
0:24:31 > 0:24:35to breathe new life into some very old jokes.
0:24:35 > 0:24:39We're here to see whether old jokes can be funny.
0:24:39 > 0:24:42It's never held me back.
0:24:42 > 0:24:45Absolutely. I've brought some old joke books.
0:24:45 > 0:24:52This is One Liners by Robert Orben, that was published in 1951.
0:24:52 > 0:24:55My Best Scotch Stories by Sir Harry Lauder,
0:24:55 > 0:24:58one of the music hall greats, that's from 1929.
0:24:58 > 0:25:03And Lewis and Faye Copeland's 10,000 Jokes, Toasts And Stories,
0:25:03 > 0:25:08which actually contains 10,065.
0:25:08 > 0:25:12We're going to do a vocal warm-up now
0:25:12 > 0:25:16because one of the things about comedians from decades past,
0:25:16 > 0:25:21was that the delivery was often more formal than you get now.
0:25:21 > 0:25:23- Think no mic.- Yes, exactly.
0:25:23 > 0:25:25If you had no mic, you've got to be heard at the back
0:25:25 > 0:25:27of the Hackney Empire or whatever.
0:25:27 > 0:25:31We're going to start off with resonators.
0:25:31 > 0:25:33You can make different parts of your body resonate
0:25:33 > 0:25:36to make it louder and that makes your voice sound a different way.
0:25:36 > 0:25:40- NASAL VOICE:- Have you had elocution lessons?- Funny you should say that!
0:25:40 > 0:25:43- No.- How very posh.
0:25:43 > 0:25:46Bit of a ladies' man is what I tend to do with my day.
0:25:46 > 0:25:49Do you find that voice attractive?
0:25:49 > 0:25:52- Do you, Michael?- No, not terribly.
0:25:52 > 0:25:53Well, I don't know then.
0:25:53 > 0:25:58Maybe I'll have more success with a higher voice. How about up here?
0:25:58 > 0:26:03- How about now?- I think it needs to be deeper. The deeper the better.
0:26:03 > 0:26:08- OK, right.- There's a great joke about a fellow goes into a pub and says...
0:26:08 > 0:26:13- NASAL VOICE:- "Excuse me, barman, can I have a pint of beer, please?
0:26:13 > 0:26:14And the barman says...
0:26:14 > 0:26:18- NASAL VOICE:- "Certainly, sir." And he looks at him.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22"Are you taking the piss out of me?" The barman says, "No, I'm not.
0:26:22 > 0:26:25"I always talk like this." "All right then."
0:26:25 > 0:26:26An RAF guy comes in.
0:26:26 > 0:26:28- UPPER CLASS VOICE:- "I say, barman.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32"A large gin and tonic with a dash of angostura." The barman says...
0:26:32 > 0:26:34- UPPER CLASS VOICE:- "Certainly, sir. Right away.
0:26:34 > 0:26:37"That'll be 3 and 9, thank you very much."
0:26:37 > 0:26:40"Thank you very much." "Here," says the other fellow.
0:26:40 > 0:26:44"I told you you were taking the piss out of me."
0:26:44 > 0:26:47"No," says the barman. "I was taking the piss out of him."
0:26:49 > 0:26:53There is a lot of jockeying for social position in telling a joke,
0:26:53 > 0:26:55which is why it can be a bit scary even just telling a joke
0:26:55 > 0:26:58to a group of strangers that you've not met before,
0:26:58 > 0:27:01because if it falls flat, your stock has fallen now
0:27:01 > 0:27:04and people think of you a little bit sadder than they thought before.
0:27:04 > 0:27:08On the other hand, if it gets a huge laugh, your stock has gone up.
0:27:08 > 0:27:11I would like you to think of a joke from the jokes you've been given
0:27:11 > 0:27:14from the books, and I'd like you to think about
0:27:14 > 0:27:16how you could tell it and also thinking about
0:27:16 > 0:27:20how you can really punch it home by getting the rhythm.
0:27:20 > 0:27:22Make it funny.
0:27:23 > 0:27:27Why do you always call your wife Honey, Mr Brown?
0:27:27 > 0:27:30Well, honey has always disagreed with me.
0:27:33 > 0:27:36"Did you hear about the awful fright George got at his wedding?"
0:27:36 > 0:27:39"Oh, yes, I was there. I saw her."
0:27:42 > 0:27:47I said to the wife, "I'm homesick." She said, "You're home."
0:27:47 > 0:27:51I said, "Yes, I know, and I'm sick of it."
0:27:51 > 0:27:55- Do you think you could tell those jokes now?- Ironically.
0:27:55 > 0:28:00Would you take that joke, the basic joke and turn it into something?
0:28:00 > 0:28:03I did that. I scribbled other ones.
0:28:03 > 0:28:07"I'd like a room for my wife and myself." He goes, "Suite, sir?"
0:28:07 > 0:28:09He goes, "Yes, she's rather perfect."
0:28:09 > 0:28:11Which I thought was far too twee
0:28:11 > 0:28:14so I said, "No, she is a pain in the arse."
0:28:14 > 0:28:17Some of them are just devastatingly sinister.
0:28:17 > 0:28:20For example, there's this one. "Never speak of the dead
0:28:20 > 0:28:23"unless you have something good to say about them.
0:28:23 > 0:28:27"My wife is dead. Good."
0:28:28 > 0:28:32Is there a sort of PC filter reading these jokes?
0:28:32 > 0:28:36As colloquialisms and stuff go, they just go really over the head.
0:28:36 > 0:28:39Young husband, "I see that sugar has gone down two points."
0:28:39 > 0:28:44Young wife, "Has it? I'll get a couple of pounds today then."
0:28:44 > 0:28:46Likewise, some of them are good, I think.
0:28:46 > 0:28:49There is one, "Good morning, Mrs Smith. I'm from the gas company.
0:28:49 > 0:28:53"I understand there's something in the house that won't work."
0:28:53 > 0:28:56"Yes, he's upstairs." I like that, it really made me chuckle.
0:28:56 > 0:28:59It's one form of entertainment
0:28:59 > 0:29:03that everybody participates in, don't they?
0:29:03 > 0:29:05Everybody tells jokes.
0:29:05 > 0:29:07In the office, in the pub,
0:29:07 > 0:29:11- at football, at bingo, wherever you are.- It is folkloric.
0:29:11 > 0:29:15- New ones as well, that's really weird.- Are there any new jokes?
0:29:15 > 0:29:18What I'm talking about is when there's a disaster
0:29:18 > 0:29:20or something topical happens,
0:29:20 > 0:29:24the jokes start maybe 12 hours after it's come on the news.
0:29:24 > 0:29:27Now, we know that they travel by Facebook and the internet
0:29:27 > 0:29:31and text and all of that, viral e-mails and all that stuff.
0:29:31 > 0:29:32But that used to happen.
0:29:32 > 0:29:35It used to happen 20, 30 years ago before the internet
0:29:35 > 0:29:36and it's just bizarre.
0:29:36 > 0:29:38How can those jokes be generated so quickly
0:29:38 > 0:29:40and how can they travel so quickly?
0:29:40 > 0:29:44I have an image of one really sick guy in a cellar with a laptop
0:29:44 > 0:29:47just going, "Ha ha!"
0:29:47 > 0:29:50Just going, "Yeah, ten people died in a fire,"
0:29:50 > 0:29:53and psychically beaming it into people's minds.
0:29:53 > 0:29:56What did Osama bin Laden cook on MasterChef?
0:29:56 > 0:29:57Big Apple Crumble.
0:30:01 > 0:30:04The joke books used by the university students may now seem
0:30:04 > 0:30:07out of date but look in the humour section of any bookshop
0:30:07 > 0:30:12and you will see that joke books are still hugely popular.
0:30:12 > 0:30:15Probably the most famous English joke book
0:30:15 > 0:30:18is Joe Miller's Jests published about 300 years ago
0:30:18 > 0:30:20and still in print today.
0:30:20 > 0:30:24A famous teacher of arithmetic who had long since been married
0:30:24 > 0:30:27without being able to get his wife with child once said to her,
0:30:27 > 0:30:30"Madam, your husband is an expert mathematician."
0:30:30 > 0:30:34"Yes," replied she. "Only he can't multiply."
0:30:34 > 0:30:38However, it's not just the contents that are of interest.
0:30:38 > 0:30:43The book itself is one of the most successful jokes in history.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46Joe Miller's Jests, first published in 1759
0:30:46 > 0:30:49and named after a famous stage comedian
0:30:49 > 0:30:51was actually released the year after his death
0:30:51 > 0:30:53in a bid to cash in on his fame.
0:30:53 > 0:30:57Reprinted and added to many times, the original edition contain jokes
0:30:57 > 0:31:03about everything from Irish men, bad breath, loose women to lawyers.
0:31:03 > 0:31:06The real joke known only to his closest friends
0:31:06 > 0:31:09was that off-stage, Joe was as serious as they come.
0:31:09 > 0:31:14He was the world's worst joke teller and he could neither read nor write.
0:31:14 > 0:31:17A gentleman said of a young wench who constantly plied her trade
0:31:17 > 0:31:20round the Temple that if she had as much law in her head
0:31:20 > 0:31:25as she had in her tail, she'd be the ablest counsel in England.
0:31:25 > 0:31:29So it was that Joe Miller, who had never told a jest in his life,
0:31:29 > 0:31:33became the author of so many jokes past and present in a book
0:31:33 > 0:31:37he'd never heard of and which he couldn't read anyway.
0:31:37 > 0:31:40An Irish lawyer having occasion to go to dinner
0:31:40 > 0:31:42left these directions written.
0:31:42 > 0:31:45"I have gone to the Elephant And Castle where you shall find me.
0:31:45 > 0:31:47"If you don't know how to read,
0:31:47 > 0:31:50"take this to a stationers who will read it for you."
0:31:53 > 0:31:56Like so many historical documents,
0:31:56 > 0:31:59the fact that a joke's written down usually means it has
0:31:59 > 0:32:03a much older oral history so they're very hard to date.
0:32:03 > 0:32:05We can trace some old jokes back
0:32:05 > 0:32:07to the very first time they're in print.
0:32:07 > 0:32:09The most famous joke of all time,
0:32:09 > 0:32:12"Why did the chicken cross the road,"
0:32:12 > 0:32:18first appeared in the March 1847 issue of New York Monthly magazine.
0:32:18 > 0:32:22Other popular jokes can be traced back to even earlier texts.
0:32:22 > 0:32:26The Elizabethans for example loved a good laugh.
0:32:26 > 0:32:29So much so they created the first English joke book -
0:32:29 > 0:32:31the Hundred Merry Tales.
0:32:31 > 0:32:35I'm hoping English Professor Carol Rutter can tell me a lot more.
0:32:37 > 0:32:40Carol, The Merry Tales - what is it, where does it come from?
0:32:40 > 0:32:46It was published in 1526 and it's a compendium of merry stories
0:32:46 > 0:32:51that talk about stupid priests, children who can't learn things,
0:32:51 > 0:32:54dumb wives.
0:32:54 > 0:32:55At a merchant's house in London,
0:32:55 > 0:32:59there lived a maid who was big with child.
0:32:59 > 0:33:02The mistress of the house commanded her to tell her
0:33:02 > 0:33:04who was the father of the child.
0:33:04 > 0:33:07The maid answered, "Forsooth, nobody."
0:33:07 > 0:33:10"What?" exclaimed the mistress. "This is not possible.
0:33:10 > 0:33:13"Someone must be the father." The maid answered, "Why, Mistress.
0:33:13 > 0:33:15"Why can't I have a child without a man
0:33:15 > 0:33:20"just as the hen lays eggs without a cock?"
0:33:20 > 0:33:22Are they bawdy, scatological?
0:33:22 > 0:33:26Of course, because that's one of the things we adore about the joke.
0:33:26 > 0:33:30In making us consult our own humanity.
0:33:31 > 0:33:34We spend so much time in our mental faculties,
0:33:34 > 0:33:36the joke reminds us that we're human.
0:33:36 > 0:33:38That we have lower parts.
0:33:38 > 0:33:40What is the most cleanliest leaf?
0:33:40 > 0:33:44The holly leaf, because no-one will wipe their arse with it.
0:33:44 > 0:33:50I think that the culture I'm looking at when I'm reading these tales
0:33:50 > 0:33:53is much closer to real body functions
0:33:53 > 0:33:56that we of course have put into cabinets,
0:33:56 > 0:33:59so we put them off camera all the time.
0:33:59 > 0:34:02A young gentleman of 20 years talked with a gentlewoman who happened
0:34:02 > 0:34:06to look upon his beard, which being young was somewhat over his lip
0:34:06 > 0:34:07but very little beneath.
0:34:07 > 0:34:13So she said to him, "Sir, ye have beard above but none below."
0:34:13 > 0:34:15He hearing her so said in sport,
0:34:15 > 0:34:18"Madam, you have beard beneath but none above."
0:34:18 > 0:34:22"Marry," said she, "then set one against the other."
0:34:22 > 0:34:25Which made the gentleman so abashed he had not one word to answer.
0:34:27 > 0:34:30Apart from the stock figures of stupid clergyman,
0:34:30 > 0:34:35unfaithful wives, mass immigration from Wales in Tudor times
0:34:35 > 0:34:40also meant the introduction of the Welshman as a figure of ridicule.
0:34:40 > 0:34:43They're lived in Heaven a group of Welshmen
0:34:43 > 0:34:46whose babbling and boasting annoyed everybody there.
0:34:46 > 0:34:49God then told St Peter that he was weary of these Welshmen
0:34:49 > 0:34:52and would be glad to have them out of heaven.
0:34:52 > 0:34:55St Peter then ran out through the heavenly gates
0:34:55 > 0:34:59and cried out in a loud voice, "Roasted cheese!"
0:34:59 > 0:35:02This being a delicacy of which Welshmen are very fond.
0:35:02 > 0:35:05They all ran out of Heaven at a brisk pace.
0:35:05 > 0:35:09St Peter seeming the whole group outside suddenly re-entered Heaven,
0:35:09 > 0:35:14locked the gates, thus keeping the Welshmen out of heaven.
0:35:14 > 0:35:19And then interestingly, because this is a Tudor book, these tales
0:35:19 > 0:35:24also include a little tag at the end that help you moralise the tale.
0:35:24 > 0:35:28And by this tale we may see that man is not wise to set his mind
0:35:28 > 0:35:32too much on delicacies or earthly pleasures, for in this,
0:35:32 > 0:35:34he may lose his celestial and eternal joy.
0:35:36 > 0:35:40100 Merry Tales is also known as Shakespeare's Jest Book,
0:35:40 > 0:35:42because he was known to borrow liberally from it.
0:35:42 > 0:35:45But more importantly to us perhaps, the Bard gives us
0:35:45 > 0:35:50the very first written example of a type of joke still told today.
0:35:50 > 0:35:57Knock, knock, knock. Who's there, in the name of Beelzebub?
0:35:57 > 0:36:02He is a farmer that hanged himself on the expectation of plenty.
0:36:02 > 0:36:06Come and dine. Have napkins and how about you?
0:36:06 > 0:36:08You'll sweat for it.
0:36:08 > 0:36:11Apparently, that was what the Elizabethans called satire.
0:36:11 > 0:36:13I guess you had to be there(!)
0:36:13 > 0:36:15It's very comforting, isn't it, that the
0:36:15 > 0:36:19English have had a sense of humour all the way back to Tudor times?
0:36:19 > 0:36:21Not a lot's changed.
0:36:21 > 0:36:23- Knock knock.- Who's there?
0:36:23 > 0:36:25- Europe.- Europe who?
0:36:25 > 0:36:26No, you're a poo!
0:36:26 > 0:36:29LAUGHTER
0:36:37 > 0:36:40Have you heard the one about the papal secretary?
0:36:40 > 0:36:43He came to London and got the piles and at the same time,
0:36:43 > 0:36:46he revived the lost art of joke telling.
0:36:46 > 0:36:50His name was Poggio - Poggio Bracciolini,
0:36:50 > 0:36:53and he stayed here in London at the townhouse
0:36:53 > 0:36:56of the Bishop of Winchester, which is right behind me.
0:36:58 > 0:37:00No wonder he got the farmers!
0:37:00 > 0:37:02The farmer Giles...piles, you see?
0:37:09 > 0:37:10Poggio is a very,
0:37:10 > 0:37:14very important figure in the history of the joke and if it weren't for
0:37:14 > 0:37:17Poggio, I suspect that many of today's comedians
0:37:17 > 0:37:19would not be working.
0:37:19 > 0:37:23Who was he? First of all, when was he is the most important thing?
0:37:23 > 0:37:27He was born in 1380, in a little town near Florence.
0:37:27 > 0:37:32By the time he was in his mid-20s, he was in Rome
0:37:32 > 0:37:36with a job as a scripter in the papal court.
0:37:36 > 0:37:39He and his friends and his enemies within the civil service
0:37:39 > 0:37:44in the papal court, would get together after a long day's work,
0:37:44 > 0:37:47and exchange insults and stories and jokes.
0:37:47 > 0:37:51The good people of Tivoli were once harangued by an imprudent monk,
0:37:51 > 0:37:55who funded a long and furious speech against the sin of adultery.
0:37:55 > 0:37:57Among other things, he declared, that the
0:37:57 > 0:38:01violation of the sanctity of wedlock was a crime of such grave character,
0:38:01 > 0:38:05that he'd rather lie with ten virgins than one married woman.
0:38:05 > 0:38:09And many of those present were of the same opinion.
0:38:09 > 0:38:13He had the idea of writing them all down. The first great joke book.
0:38:13 > 0:38:15Exactly. He wrote them down years later.
0:38:15 > 0:38:18He wanted to remember some of these funny stories.
0:38:18 > 0:38:22One day, the sea being rough, all those aboard the ship were
0:38:22 > 0:38:25ordered by the captain to throw overboard their heaviest belongings.
0:38:25 > 0:38:28There was among them, a man who took hold of his wife to cast her aboard.
0:38:28 > 0:38:29For, he said,
0:38:29 > 0:38:33she was the heaviest and most burdensome thing he possessed.
0:38:33 > 0:38:37The Liber Facetiarum, usually called simply the Facetiae,
0:38:37 > 0:38:41was the first volume of its kind to be published in Europe.
0:38:41 > 0:38:45It contains fat jokes, drunk jokes, sex jokes and fart jokes,
0:38:45 > 0:38:49as well as a lot of jokes about randy or corrupt priests.
0:38:50 > 0:38:52An old bishop who I knew,
0:38:52 > 0:38:55complained that he lost a number of his teeth already and that the
0:38:55 > 0:38:59others were shaking so badly, that he feared he'd lose those also.
0:38:59 > 0:39:03At this, a man of the district said, "You shall not fear.
0:39:03 > 0:39:05"You'll not lose your teeth."
0:39:05 > 0:39:08"Why not?" asked the bishop, curiously.
0:39:08 > 0:39:10"My testicles have been hanging loose these last 40 years,
0:39:10 > 0:39:14"seemingly at the point of falling off, yet I've never lost them!"
0:39:16 > 0:39:19The reason why we don't have a lot of joke books
0:39:19 > 0:39:23from the 600 and 700 years before Poggio, is because the monks,
0:39:23 > 0:39:26the monasteries had a bit of an monopoly on book production.
0:39:26 > 0:39:29Because it was expensive and because they...
0:39:29 > 0:39:33- It was labour-intensive. It took forever.- Very labour-intensive.
0:39:33 > 0:39:35For all we know, they may have told a lot of jokes.
0:39:35 > 0:39:38I suspect they probably did. Human beings do.
0:39:38 > 0:39:42One day, in order to entertain Lorenzo di Medici, an ambassador
0:39:42 > 0:39:45bought a boy of some five or six years,
0:39:45 > 0:39:47who had extraordinary talent and wit.
0:39:47 > 0:39:50When the boy had made everyone wonder, Lorenzo turned to
0:39:50 > 0:39:53the ambassador and asked him what he thought of the child.
0:39:53 > 0:39:57The boy's brains will be grown for certain when he is grown-up,
0:39:57 > 0:40:00but, replied the ambassador, children who are very clever when they are
0:40:00 > 0:40:04little, become very dull and commonplace when they are grown.
0:40:04 > 0:40:06The boy turned to the ambassador and said, "Why sir,
0:40:06 > 0:40:10"you must have been extremely clever when you were little!"
0:40:10 > 0:40:12- He did actually come to London at one point.- He did.
0:40:12 > 0:40:16He came to London round about 1420.
0:40:16 > 0:40:19- He absolutely hated it.- Oh!
0:40:19 > 0:40:22He wrote letters home complaining about the people,
0:40:22 > 0:40:24they were stupid and ignorant
0:40:24 > 0:40:27and didn't like books as much as he did.
0:40:27 > 0:40:31The weather was terrible and he had terrible piles.
0:40:31 > 0:40:34Have you got any examples of his English jokes or his
0:40:34 > 0:40:38- anti-English jokes? - As it happens, I do.
0:40:38 > 0:40:41This is a joke about an Englishman at a banquet.
0:40:41 > 0:40:45A beaker of wine was once brought to an Englishman at a banquet
0:40:45 > 0:40:47and all present took their wine from it.
0:40:47 > 0:40:50While the Englishman was putting it to his lips
0:40:50 > 0:40:53he saw a dead fly in it, which he took out.
0:40:53 > 0:40:55Then, after having taken his drink,
0:40:55 > 0:40:58he replaced the dead fly in the wine.
0:40:58 > 0:41:02Asked why he did this, he replied, I personally don't like flies
0:41:02 > 0:41:06in my wine, but how am I to know if some of you do not like them?
0:41:06 > 0:41:09- He handed on the beaker.- There you are, the first fly-in-my-soup joke.
0:41:09 > 0:41:11Exactly. There's actually an Irish joke.
0:41:11 > 0:41:15- The earliest recorded joke about a stupid Irishman...- Really?
0:41:15 > 0:41:16..is in his book.
0:41:16 > 0:41:19The Irish captain of a merchant vessel was caught in a storm.
0:41:19 > 0:41:20His ship was so buffeted
0:41:20 > 0:41:24and tossed by the tempest that he despaired he'd ever save her.
0:41:24 > 0:41:29The captain made a vow, that if she was saved, he'd make an ex-voto
0:41:29 > 0:41:32of a huge candle that would be as big as the master of his ship.
0:41:32 > 0:41:36When a friend said to him, that such a vow was impossible as there was not
0:41:36 > 0:41:38enough wax in all of England to make such a candle,
0:41:38 > 0:41:40the captain said, "Be quiet,
0:41:40 > 0:41:42"and let me promise what I want to the mother of God,
0:41:42 > 0:41:45"for when we're all saved, she will be as happy with a penny candle!"
0:41:48 > 0:41:51Are there any jokes that you've actually laughed out loud at
0:41:51 > 0:41:54- when you read them?- There are some excellent jokes in there.
0:41:54 > 0:41:56Most of them are far too filthy,
0:41:56 > 0:41:59this is the thing we haven't really talked about
0:41:59 > 0:42:02and it might surprise people because Poggio worked for the Pope.
0:42:02 > 0:42:06There's a lot of jokes about religion in there,
0:42:06 > 0:42:11- but it's as blue as they come. - Really? Filthy?- Yeah.
0:42:11 > 0:42:14- Absolutely filthy. - Surprisingly at the time
0:42:14 > 0:42:15the Facetiae was published,
0:42:15 > 0:42:19not a word of condemnation was heard from the Vatican.
0:42:19 > 0:42:23This was probably due to the fact that they were written in Latin,
0:42:23 > 0:42:26which meant they were safe to be enjoyed by the learned,
0:42:26 > 0:42:28without corrupting the masses.
0:42:28 > 0:42:32Later commentators, however, were not so broad-minded.
0:42:32 > 0:42:34In 1802, the Reverend William Shepherd,
0:42:34 > 0:42:37the author of Poggio's biography,
0:42:37 > 0:42:40expressed his shock that, "an apostolic secretary who
0:42:40 > 0:42:43"enjoyed the friendship and esteem of the pontiff,
0:42:43 > 0:42:45"should have published a number of stories which outraged
0:42:45 > 0:42:49"the laws of decency and put modesty to the blush."
0:42:49 > 0:42:52A young woman of Florence, who was not richly endowed with wisdom,
0:42:52 > 0:42:56lay at the point of childbirth and suffered terrible pain.
0:42:56 > 0:42:59When her travail endured for a long time, the midwife took a candle
0:42:59 > 0:43:03and looked below to see if there was any sign of the child.
0:43:03 > 0:43:06At this, the suffering woman instructed her to also look
0:43:06 > 0:43:10behind for the child, insomuch as her husband had, on occasion,
0:43:10 > 0:43:12also used the back road! Ohh!
0:43:15 > 0:43:19- I think we owe Poggio a very great deal, don't you?- I think we do.
0:43:19 > 0:43:23We know that jokes do travel as part of an oral tradition,
0:43:23 > 0:43:26they travel from country to country and from person-to-person.
0:43:26 > 0:43:31he's the first writer to really get jokes into print.
0:43:31 > 0:43:35His mixture of high-minded scholarship
0:43:35 > 0:43:39and a love of filthy jokes is a laudable one and it makes him
0:43:39 > 0:43:42quite a lovable character really.
0:43:42 > 0:43:45A Florentine had in his household a young man
0:43:45 > 0:43:47who used to tutor his children.
0:43:47 > 0:43:51The tutor eventually felt so at home that he had, in turn,
0:43:51 > 0:43:55the housemaid, the nurse and finally the mistress herself.
0:43:55 > 0:43:57The master of the house when he discovered this,
0:43:57 > 0:43:59summoned the young man and said to him,
0:43:59 > 0:44:02"I find it unmannerly of you, sir.
0:44:02 > 0:44:04"You take your pleasure of my entire household
0:44:04 > 0:44:07"and you make an exception of me?"
0:44:09 > 0:44:14Poggio's influence is still around today. Have a listen to this.
0:44:14 > 0:44:17A guy runs over a cat and feels really bad about it,
0:44:17 > 0:44:19so goes to the address on the cat's collar.
0:44:19 > 0:44:21A little old lady answers the door
0:44:21 > 0:44:25and he says, "I am really sorry, I've run over your cat and killed it.
0:44:25 > 0:44:27"Can I replace it?"
0:44:27 > 0:44:30The old lady thinks for a while and then she says,
0:44:30 > 0:44:32"How good are you at catching mice?"
0:44:32 > 0:44:34LAUGHTER
0:44:34 > 0:44:37Now, watch this.
0:44:37 > 0:44:40Matteo Franco, whose cat mewed when he pulled its ears,
0:44:40 > 0:44:44threw the cat out of the window, saying, now I will catch my own mice.
0:44:51 > 0:44:53Before Poggio, you have to go back
0:44:53 > 0:44:56about 1,000 years to find a good joke book.
0:44:56 > 0:45:00But this one is the grandaddy of them all.
0:45:00 > 0:45:03If you think the joke you are about to see is old, you are right.
0:45:03 > 0:45:05But it's a lot older than you think.
0:45:07 > 0:45:11Doctor, doctor, I keep hurting my arm in lots of different places.
0:45:11 > 0:45:12Well, stop going there, then!
0:45:12 > 0:45:14LAUGHTER
0:45:14 > 0:45:18The joke is sometimes said to have been invented by Palamedes,
0:45:18 > 0:45:20the hero of Greek legend.
0:45:20 > 0:45:24However, as he is also credited with inventing numbers, the alphabet,
0:45:24 > 0:45:27lighthouses, dice and the practice of eating meals
0:45:27 > 0:45:31at regular intervals, we should take that with a pinch of salt.
0:45:31 > 0:45:34What we do know is that the oldest surviving joke book is from
0:45:34 > 0:45:39ancient Greece and it is full of subjects we still make jokes about -
0:45:39 > 0:45:44drunks, stupid people and the very first doctor doctor joke.
0:45:44 > 0:45:46Professor John Morgan can tell us more.
0:45:49 > 0:45:52John, are they funny today, some of them?
0:45:52 > 0:45:56There are individuals like myself who find them funny, yeah!
0:45:56 > 0:46:00When I try them on my students, they generally groan and roll their eyes.
0:46:00 > 0:46:03Doctor, doctor, when I wake up in the morning,
0:46:03 > 0:46:05I felt dizzy for half an hour.
0:46:05 > 0:46:07Then get up half an hour later!
0:46:07 > 0:46:12What we learn from this is that joke telling us we know it today,
0:46:12 > 0:46:16goes all the way back, people told jokes back in the days
0:46:16 > 0:46:18of the Greeks and Romans.
0:46:18 > 0:46:21We do know there were joke books in existence
0:46:21 > 0:46:25at least in the fifth century before Christ.
0:46:25 > 0:46:28One man says to the other, "I had your wife last night.
0:46:28 > 0:46:32"As her husband, I have to," came the reply. "What's your excuse?
0:46:32 > 0:46:35What sort of people were the butts of the jokes,
0:46:35 > 0:46:38because every joke has to be at the expense of somebody, doesn't it?
0:46:38 > 0:46:42Most of the jokes in this collection are aimed at people
0:46:42 > 0:46:46called a scholasticos, the professor or a student,
0:46:46 > 0:46:50some kind of useless academic, so academic he has become an idiot.
0:46:50 > 0:46:55There are one or two which are aimed at ethnic targets
0:46:55 > 0:46:58or people from neighbouring cities,
0:46:58 > 0:47:01so you can tell jokes about your stupid neighbours.
0:47:01 > 0:47:05Like our Irish jokes or the French making jokes about the Belgians,
0:47:05 > 0:47:09- Americans about the Canadians? - In Swansea, we tell Llanelli jokes.
0:47:09 > 0:47:11A Chymian goes to visit his friend
0:47:11 > 0:47:14and stands outside his house shouting for him.
0:47:14 > 0:47:17A neighbour sticks his head out of the window and says, "Hey,
0:47:17 > 0:47:19"shout louder, then he'll hear you."
0:47:19 > 0:47:21So the Chymian goes, "Oi, louder."
0:47:24 > 0:47:26What purpose do you think a joke book served?
0:47:26 > 0:47:29What was the need for a joke book?
0:47:29 > 0:47:33One context is that these are tools for dinner parties.
0:47:35 > 0:47:39We know that there was quite a widespread class
0:47:39 > 0:47:44of people in Rome particularly, but also in Greece, called parasites.
0:47:44 > 0:47:49These were people who scrounged at the tables of rich men
0:47:49 > 0:47:51and earned their keep by being witty and humorous
0:47:51 > 0:47:53and good conversationalists.
0:47:53 > 0:47:58At a woman's funeral, a stranger solemnly asks, "Who is resting here?"
0:47:58 > 0:48:01"I am, cried the widower, now that she's gone!"
0:48:02 > 0:48:06Another is that it was written for circulation in barbers' shops,
0:48:06 > 0:48:09because the barber shop in the ancient world,
0:48:09 > 0:48:11was not just a place where you were in and out of in ten minutes.
0:48:11 > 0:48:14It was a place where you'd go and have a drink
0:48:14 > 0:48:17and talk to your friends and swap the gossip
0:48:17 > 0:48:19and we know that it was a place where news was exchanged.
0:48:19 > 0:48:22So a book of jokes for a barber to tell his customers
0:48:22 > 0:48:26or for people to take to the barber's shop was quite popular.
0:48:26 > 0:48:29A barber asked his client how he'd like his hair cut.
0:48:29 > 0:48:31In silence, came the reply.
0:48:31 > 0:48:34Unlike their later counterparts, the jokes in the Philogelos
0:48:34 > 0:48:36are short and pointed.
0:48:36 > 0:48:38They take on a gallery of stock characters - the doctor,
0:48:38 > 0:48:42the drunk, the miser, the braggart, and the scholasticos.
0:48:42 > 0:48:45A scholastic sees a deep well in his own field
0:48:45 > 0:48:46and asks if the water is drinkable.
0:48:46 > 0:48:50His farmhand tells him that his parents used to drink from it.
0:48:50 > 0:48:54"Oh," says the scholasticos, "what long necks they must have had,"
0:48:54 > 0:48:57There aren't too many sort of bum and willy jokes,
0:48:57 > 0:49:02- but there are jokes about people with hernias.- Hernias?- Hernias.
0:49:02 > 0:49:06- Gracious. Hernias are funny in that period!- Apparently.
0:49:06 > 0:49:11What did the Abderite eunuch get for his birthday?
0:49:11 > 0:49:12A hernia!
0:49:18 > 0:49:21What? A hernia!
0:49:23 > 0:49:24No? Ehh...
0:49:24 > 0:49:28There are also jokes about people with bad breath which must
0:49:28 > 0:49:33- have been...- No toothpaste. - No toothpaste. No dental hygiene.
0:49:33 > 0:49:37I imagine people just had mouths full of decaying teeth, so there is
0:49:37 > 0:49:41a nice joke about a man with bad breath who goes to the doctor.
0:49:41 > 0:49:45He says, "Doctor, doctor, I think my uvula has come down."
0:49:45 > 0:49:49The doctor says, "Open your mouth.
0:49:49 > 0:49:51"Oh, no, it's not your uvula that has come down,
0:49:51 > 0:49:53"it is your arsehole that's come up!"
0:49:53 > 0:49:55MICHAEL LAUGHS HEARTILY
0:49:57 > 0:50:02- Very good! Very good!- You see the calibre of the jokes?- Yes, yes.
0:50:02 > 0:50:05Those are jokes about people's shortcomings and misfortunes,
0:50:05 > 0:50:07aren't they really?
0:50:07 > 0:50:10It's another way of making a bond between the audience
0:50:10 > 0:50:14and the teller, against someone who's different from themselves.
0:50:14 > 0:50:15Did you hear about the Abderite
0:50:15 > 0:50:17who heard that onions and cabbage cause wind?
0:50:17 > 0:50:20He took a sack of the vegetables out sailing with them
0:50:20 > 0:50:21and hung them from the stern!
0:50:23 > 0:50:27The Philegelos was lost during the Dark Ages and with it,
0:50:27 > 0:50:29seemingly the art of the joke.
0:50:29 > 0:50:32But humour was kept alive by folk tales, which made their way
0:50:32 > 0:50:34over from the Middle East.
0:50:34 > 0:50:36Once in Europe, they began to separate -
0:50:36 > 0:50:39on the one hand with the invention of printing
0:50:39 > 0:50:42and the rise of literacy, they grew longer,
0:50:42 > 0:50:45turning into chivalric romance and finally the novel.
0:50:45 > 0:50:49In their oral form, however, they got shorter, shedding details
0:50:49 > 0:50:52and growing more formulaic, condensing into the kinds
0:50:52 > 0:50:56of jokes catalogued by Poggio and 100 Merry Tales.
0:50:56 > 0:51:00Surprisingly then, it is during the Dark Ages, that we find
0:51:00 > 0:51:04what are considered the first very English jokes.
0:51:09 > 0:51:13GREGORIAN STYLE CHANTING
0:51:14 > 0:51:15The Exeter Codex
0:51:15 > 0:51:19is the oldest surviving book of English literature.
0:51:19 > 0:51:22Scribed by monks, it contains a vast number of religious poems,
0:51:22 > 0:51:24which would have been chanted on-site.
0:51:24 > 0:51:28However, nestled amongst these, are about 90 riddles,
0:51:28 > 0:51:32a number of which are most definitely not suitable for church.
0:51:32 > 0:51:35What hangs by a man's thigh?
0:51:35 > 0:51:37Stiff and it's strong.
0:51:37 > 0:51:40It likes to poke a hole that it's often poked before.
0:51:41 > 0:51:42A key!
0:51:49 > 0:51:50So while the people of the 10th century
0:51:50 > 0:51:52might have found the Exeter riddles funny,
0:51:52 > 0:51:55I am not sure they are side-splitting to today's ears.
0:51:55 > 0:51:58But it is good to know the monks enjoyed a good knob gag.
0:51:58 > 0:52:02To find out why some jokes stand the test of time and some just don't,
0:52:02 > 0:52:06I have come to talk to Paul Mcdonald who has made a study of the subject.
0:52:06 > 0:52:09He also claims to have discovered the world's oldest joke.
0:52:10 > 0:52:13It's amazing, you know, hundreds and hundreds
0:52:13 > 0:52:15and hundreds of years ago, people are telling jokes,
0:52:15 > 0:52:18maybe different jokes in a different way and a different setting,
0:52:18 > 0:52:22but they feel the need to tell jokes and make people laugh.
0:52:22 > 0:52:25How do you entertain a bored pharaoh?
0:52:25 > 0:52:27You get a boatload of young women,
0:52:27 > 0:52:29dressed only in fishing nets and you sail them down the Nile.
0:52:29 > 0:52:32And you urge the pharaoh to go catch a fish.
0:52:35 > 0:52:39The first jokes would have been practical jokes.
0:52:39 > 0:52:44There's a theory called the false alarm theory, which suggests
0:52:44 > 0:52:49that laughter was a response to something that was originally
0:52:49 > 0:52:54perceived as dangerous, but which turned out to be benign.
0:52:54 > 0:52:57So, somebody would see something that they thought was a lion.
0:52:57 > 0:53:00Their adrenaline would start pumping as a consequence of that.
0:53:00 > 0:53:05It would turn out to be a donkey. And they would relax.
0:53:05 > 0:53:09And that relaxation was a pleasurable experience.
0:53:09 > 0:53:10So the earliest jokes
0:53:10 > 0:53:12would have been people trying to surprise people.
0:53:12 > 0:53:15To recreate that pleasure.
0:53:15 > 0:53:17- Knock, knock.- Who's there?
0:53:17 > 0:53:20- The interrupting doctor.- Interrup... - You have cancer!
0:53:20 > 0:53:21LAUGHTER
0:53:21 > 0:53:28Then when people began to develop the cerebral capacity
0:53:28 > 0:53:31to recreate these things in language,
0:53:31 > 0:53:34that's what they did in the form of jokes.
0:53:34 > 0:53:36Jesus is on the gates of heaven and he suddenly sees an old man.
0:53:36 > 0:53:40And he says to the old man, "What are you doing here?"
0:53:40 > 0:53:45The old man says, "I am here to find my son." Jesus says, "Tell me more."
0:53:45 > 0:53:50"He says he was a special boy." And Jesus says, "Tell me more."
0:53:50 > 0:53:55And he says, "Well, he had holes in his hands and holes in his feet."
0:53:55 > 0:54:00And Jesus goes, "Father!" And the old man goes, "Pinocchio!"
0:54:00 > 0:54:05Have you seen a consistent thread of things that people laugh about
0:54:05 > 0:54:07over the centuries?
0:54:07 > 0:54:09People tend to laugh at sex.
0:54:09 > 0:54:12- I had sex with one of me old girlfriends the other night.- Really?
0:54:12 > 0:54:14Yeah, she's 96!
0:54:17 > 0:54:20There are lots and lots of jokes throughout the history of joking
0:54:20 > 0:54:23that challenge authority in various ways.
0:54:23 > 0:54:27Politicians and nappies have one thing in common.
0:54:27 > 0:54:31They should both be changed regularly and for the same reason.
0:54:31 > 0:54:32LAUGHTER
0:54:32 > 0:54:35Jokes about stupidity you can find in the earliest examples.
0:54:35 > 0:54:39It's always other people's stupidity. You pick on a group.
0:54:39 > 0:54:42- You make jokes about them. - Yeah, I think so.
0:54:42 > 0:54:45Blaming other people for the problems
0:54:45 > 0:54:48that any society encounters, I suppose.
0:54:48 > 0:54:53It tends to be humour that makes us feel better about ourselves.
0:54:53 > 0:54:57Irishman fell 100 foot down a pit shaft. Crash!
0:54:57 > 0:55:01And they shouted down to him, "Paddy, did you break anything?"
0:55:01 > 0:55:04He said, "No, there's nothing down here!"
0:55:06 > 0:55:09How important is the social context of a joke?
0:55:09 > 0:55:13It's crucial, in a manner of speaking.
0:55:13 > 0:55:16Jokes are very context dependent.
0:55:16 > 0:55:22So, for instance, there are jokes in the earliest existing joke book,
0:55:22 > 0:55:25that feature lettuce, for instance. Lettuce was hilarious.
0:55:25 > 0:55:28If you read those jokes that feature lettuce,
0:55:28 > 0:55:30you won't understand why they're funny,
0:55:30 > 0:55:33but if you know that lettuce was considered to be an aphrodisiac
0:55:33 > 0:55:371,500 years ago, then, the comic import of that material
0:55:37 > 0:55:42- becomes obvious.- It's a Viagra joke. - They're essentially Viagra jokes.
0:55:42 > 0:55:44A scholasticos sits down to dinner with his dad.
0:55:44 > 0:55:48And before him sits a huge lettuce with lots of sprouts going off it.
0:55:48 > 0:55:52The scholasticos goes, "Eh, father, you eat the children
0:55:52 > 0:55:53"and I'll eat the mother!" Ohh!
0:55:56 > 0:55:58How on earth are you find the world's oldest joke?
0:55:58 > 0:56:00What set you on the path?
0:56:00 > 0:56:03You have to go to the world's oldest texts
0:56:03 > 0:56:06and the world's oldest texts are the texts written in cuneiform,
0:56:06 > 0:56:10an early form of writing, in Ancient Sumer.
0:56:10 > 0:56:13And because humour is fundamental to the human condition, there is
0:56:13 > 0:56:17a very good chance that humour is going to feature in those texts.
0:56:17 > 0:56:19Which it does.
0:56:19 > 0:56:23And so, I looked through the riddles and proverbs,
0:56:23 > 0:56:27the short narratives, in other words, and tried to identify those
0:56:27 > 0:56:30narratives that had incongruities
0:56:30 > 0:56:34of a kind that you associate with joking.
0:56:34 > 0:56:36DRUM ROLL
0:56:36 > 0:56:42'Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, the world's oldest joke.'
0:56:42 > 0:56:45Something which has not occurred since time immemorial.
0:56:45 > 0:56:48That a young woman did not fart in her husband's embrace.
0:56:48 > 0:56:51APPLAUSE
0:56:51 > 0:56:52AUDIENCE CHEERS
0:56:52 > 0:56:55AUDIENCE BOOS
0:57:06 > 0:57:12- How far back can you trace that one?- About 4,000 years old.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15Is it really? So, yes, 1,800 BC.
0:57:15 > 0:57:19So one assumes it was in circulation before it was actually documented.
0:57:19 > 0:57:20What did you learn from that?
0:57:20 > 0:57:24What does that teach us about jokes and joke telling?
0:57:24 > 0:57:27Well, it teaches us that flatulence is funny!
0:57:27 > 0:57:32- There's something inherently funny. - It's still funny.- It's still funny.
0:57:32 > 0:57:35There's this guy standing in a bar having a pint.
0:57:35 > 0:57:38All of a sudden, he lets off this enormous fart.
0:57:38 > 0:57:41The man next to him taps him on the shoulder and says,
0:57:41 > 0:57:43"Excuse me, you've just farted in front of my wife."
0:57:43 > 0:57:45The guy turns round and says, "I'm really sorry,
0:57:45 > 0:57:48"I didn't know it was her turn."
0:57:48 > 0:57:49LAUGHTER
0:57:50 > 0:57:55So, there you have it. The world's oldest joke is a fart joke.
0:57:55 > 0:57:58Well, given the odd herniated eunuch and some limp lettuce leaves,
0:57:58 > 0:58:01I guess we're still laughing at the same stuff our ancestors
0:58:01 > 0:58:04laughed at, thousands of years ago.
0:58:04 > 0:58:09As Gertrude Stein so rightly said, "A joke is a joke is a joke,
0:58:09 > 0:58:11"so long as it's funny!"
0:58:24 > 0:58:26Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd