History is fascinating — if that’s something that floats your boat. There’s the family drama, the moments that shaped who we are as humans, like the wars, plagues, betrayals, and everything else that’s a little dramatic but ultimately paved the way for all of us.

Of course, you may be someone who thought snoozing through history lessons was far more interesting than the actual lesson. But some memes posted online might just be so funny that they bring out the history buff in you. And so, we’ve rounded up a bunch of history memes from Instagram for anyone hoping to get a laugh out of the absurdity and melodrama of the past.

History and memes aren’t something you'd immediately think go hand in hand. Well, aside from the fact that memes are technically part of history, because everything that happens in the time-space continuum eventually becomes history. But our point is that memes aren’t usually the subject of historical facts or anything too… serious or dull.

Funnily enough, though, one of the original meme formats from before the internet actually came about during a pretty important historical moment: World War II. American soldiers apparently drew bald, long-nosed figures on walls across military routes around the world, often accompanied by the phrase “Kilroy was here.” It is considered one of humanity’s first memes, long before the internet was even a thing.

But what actually created the word “meme”? History points to Richard Dawkins as the term's father. He coined the word in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene , where he defined it as an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.

He essentially combined two words: mimeme, derived from the Ancient Greek word meaning “to imitate,” and gene . He shortened mimeme to make it sound more like gene . In his words, these memes can be a melody, a catchphrase, or even a fashion trend. The concept differs slightly from what Dawkins initially had in mind, but he embraced it, calling it a “hijacking of the original idea.”

But the world’s oldest joke , which is, again, a part of history, actually comes from a really unexpected place. Apparently, an ancient Sumerian tablet contains the oldest joke in human history, and it is nothing more than a fart joke. It reads: “Something which has never occurred since time immemorial: a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap.”

The joke is from the Old Babylonian period but may date back as far as 2,300 BC. At the time, it was the pinnacle of human humor, and frankly, it does seem fitting that our sense of humor hasn’t fundamentally changed in 4,000 years . To this day, fart jokes, or just a fart, are still among the funniest things around, regardless of age.