Everyone ’s heard of the " And All I Got Was This stinking T - Shirt " liothyronine - shirts , even if you are favorable enough never to have been the benefactive role of one .
But it turns out the Romans were in on the jest 2,000 years before us . archaeologist discovered the ancient Roman equivalent of an " I went to Rome and all I got you was this lousy stylus " buried at a site cheeseparing to the River Walbrook , an x - tributary of the Thames .
The atomic number 26 stylus is the ancient Roman eq of a pen and would have been used to cut up words into a wax - fill wooden written material tab . Archaeologists have date the style to 70 CE – just 10 after the founding of Roman London ( orLondinium ) in 50 CE .
The transcription ( in Latin , of course ) literally translates to :
" I have come from the City . I add you a welcome endowment …
" ab urbe v[e]n[i ] munus tibi gratum adf(e)ro …
… with a piercing point that you may remember me …
… acul[eat]um ut habe[a]s memor[ia]m nostra(m ) …
… I need , if fortune allow , that I might be able ( to give ) …
… rogo si fortuna dar[e]t quo possem …
… as liberally as the way is tenacious ( and ) as my purse is empty . ”
… largius ut longa via ceu sacculus est ( v)acuus "
It ’s a clapper - in - nerve substance to remember the transmitter by – a transmitter who acknowledge the nowadays ’s fundamental cheapness . It is , essentially , a 2,000 - yr - old example of the character of novelty gifts we continue to share today , proving ( once again ) that humans never change .
As the researchers point out , it even contains its share of spelling errors . For example , the scribe appears to run out of space and so give out the " m " in " nostram " .
While the message does n’t of necessity spell out that it ’s from Rome , the investigator think the City reference is the upper-case letter of the Empire , demonstrating the close ties between the two city , despite Londinium ’s place at the Empire ’s bound . As the Museum of London excuse on itswebsite , the main metropolis of Britannia was a thriving outside embrasure and of import in its own right .
" This unparalleled inscribed stylus put up a new windowpane on Londinium ’s international link and its literary culture , " Senior Roman Finds Specialist Michael Marshall at Museum of London Archaeology ( MOLA ) said ina statement , " but it also provides us with very tangible human connection to the proprietor and to the person who gave them this affectionate , if inexpensive , giving . "
The artifact was found during a 2012 - 2014excavationat the Bloomberg European HQ in London , which unearthed more than 14,000 artifacts , 63,000 shard of Roman clayware , and 3 tonnes of animal bone – that includes the first written reference to Londonium and 200 stylus . ( Though this is the only one still bare any lettering . )
While the ancient Romans can be painted as a corporate ofruthless invadersandgluttonous foodieswith an admiration forcommunal washup , rakehell variation , androadmaking , this goes to show that they were more like us than you might imagine .
It seems humans have always enjoyed dad gag , dirty jokes , andpenis graffiti – a reminder thatsome things never deepen .
