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# Was the Oldest Smiley Found on a 3,700-Year-Old Jug?
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/was-the-oldest-smiley-found-on-a-3700-year-old-jug/
- Published: 2017-07-20T15:53:56.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:41:00.000Z
- Description: A new archeological discovery may suggest the first known “smiley” is thousands of years older than previously thought.
- Author: Claire Voon
- Tags: In Brief, Archaeology, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:30(2016, 2017, part 3)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2017/07/02_17k7926.jpg)

Painted flask from 1700 BCE found in a burial under a house in area A East, Karkemish (photo courtesy Nicolò Marchetti)

Archaeologists in southern Turkey have dug up an ancient precedent to the Kool-Aid Man. Recent excavations at the ancient Hittite city of Karkemish have revealed a bulbous pitcher decorated with a faint smiley face, as Anadolu Agency first [reported](http://aa.com.tr/en/culture-and-art/ancient-pot-discovery-in-turkey-contests-smiley-origin/863503?ref=hyperallergic.com). At 3,700 years old, the grin predates by a long shot what scientists in Slovakia had previously dubbed the world’s oldest smiley face, [a 17th-century drawing](http://www.ibtimes.com/worlds-oldest-emoji-discovered-scientists-slovakia-say-they-found-smiley-face-emoji-2486982?ref=hyperallergic.com) on a legal document.

As head researcher Nicolò Marchetti [put it](http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/Default.aspx?NewsCatID=375&nID=115642&pageID=238&ref=hyperallergic.com), “We have probably found the oldest smiley emoji. We do not know with which purpose the craftsmen drew this symbol on the pitcher, but we call it a smile.”

Marchetti, an associate professor at the University of Bologna, has been leading the seven-year long excavations at Karkemish, which today lies along the border between Turkey and Syria. The short-necked pitcher is one of the most interesting artifacts found so far at the site, which has also yielded a number of urns, pots, and vases. Found in a burial chamber beneath a house, the unusual vessel was once used for drinking sweet sherbet. It will eventually go on view at the nearby Gaziantep Museum of Archaeology — so yes, you’ll be able to get a selfie of yourself smiling with the one-of-a-kind, jolly jug.

“The smiling face is undoubtedly there and has no parallels in ancient ceramic art,” Marchetti told Hyperallergic. “As for the interpretation, you may certainly choose your own.”