The comedian George Wallace: “The chicken is the only creature on Earth that never dies of natural causes.”
[snip] One of the earliest examples of bar jokes is Sumerian (c. 4500–1900 BC), and it features a dog: “A dog walked into a tavern and said, ‘I can’t see a thing. I’ll open this one’.” [1] The humor of it is probably related to the Sumer way of life and has been lost, but the words remain. [/snip]
An added problem is that most of the extant manuscripts date to the Old Babylonian period (c. 18th century BCE), when Sumerian had already died out as a spoken language. In fact, these proverbs were used in the education of scribes to teach them Sumerian, so there is a good chance that some of the punchlines were already 'lost in translation' by the time these manuscripts were written.
Seems like the only thing he could "see" to open would be an eye, or the tavern. Perhaps "dog" was idiomatic for a bar owner, and the proprietor/bartender never sees a thing that's going on in the tavern (or he wouldn't have been in business for long).
I didn't see that one suggested.
“A dog walked into a tavern and said, ‘I can’t see a thing. I’ll open this one’.”
0:52 — ‘A dog walked into a tavern and said: “I can’t see a thing. I’ll open this one!”’
The Sumerian Dog Joke That Makes No Sense
23:22
The Histocrat
476K subscribers
232,278 views
September 24, 2023
Hey folks, here’s a quick side video examining the meaning of an old archaeology meme that did the rounds last year! Its deliberately very different from my normal style so I hope you enjoy! Next video will be a normal documentary style episode or a podcast! References/corrections are in the pinned comment below!