continued: 'One of my favourite jokes from the book, and probably one of the longest, is about a barber, a professor and a bald man,' she added (see panel above). Another of the jokes - said to be dated to 248AD when Rome held what was billed as the 'Millennium Games' - tells the story of a distraught athlete.

'Never mind,' says a spectator. 'You can always try again at the next Millennium Games.'

There is also an ancient version of the Monty Python dead parrot sketch.

It reads: 'A man buys a slave, who dies soon after. When he complains, the slave seller replies, "Well, he didn't die when I owned him".'

I used to love the "Carry On" series. Whatever happened to them?