Flatulence humor, or Rude humour (more commonly known as fart humor) refers to any type of joke, practical joke device, or other off-color humor related to flatulence. History Although it is likely that flatulence humor has long been considered funny in cultures that consider the public passing of gas impolite, such jokes are rarely recorded. It's been suggested that one of the oldest recorded jokes was a flatulence joke from the Sumerians that has been dated to 1,900 BC. Two important early texts are the 5th century BC plays The Knights and The Clouds, both by Aristophanes, which contain numerous fart jokes. Another example from classical times appeared in Apocolocyntosis or The Pumpkinification of Claudius, a satire attributed to Seneca on the late Roman emperor: He later explains he got to the afterlife with a quote from Homer: Archeologist Warwick Ball asserts that the Roman Emperor Elagabalus played practical jokes on his guests, employing a whoopee cushion-like device at dinner parties. In the translated version of Penguin's 1001 Arabian Nights Tales, a story entitled "The Historic Fart" tells of a man who flees his country from the sheer embarrassment of farting at his wedding, only to return ten years later to discover that his fart had become so famous, that people used the anniversary of its occurrence to date other events. Upon learning this he exclaimed, "Verily, my fart has become a date! It shall be remembered forever!" His embarrassment is so great he returns to exile in India. In a similar vein, John Aubrey's Brief Lives recounts of Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford that: "The Earle of Oxford, making his low obeisance to Queen Elizabeth, happened to let a Fart, at which he was so abashed and ashamed that he went to Travell, 7 yeares. Upon his return home, the Queen greeted him, reportedly saying "My Lord, I had forgot the Fart." One of the most celebrated incidents of flatulence humor in early English literature is in The Miller's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer, which dates from the 14th century; The Summoner's Tale has another. In the first, the character Nicholas sticks his buttocks out of a window at night and humiliates his rival Absolom by farting in his face. But Absolom gets revenge by thrusting a red-hot plough blade between Nicholas's cheeks ("ammyd the ers") The medieval Latin joke book Facetiae includes six tales about farting. François