Angsty note left by a son to his mom in ancient times proves bratty teens have always existed
That fact that he chiseled into stone…
So all teenagers are awful. Got it.
Ever find yourself lamenting about how bratty, vain, entitled, whiney [insert any additional insult you wish] teens today are? True, maybe our generation didn’t have screen-addicted Sephora kids, but let’s admit that we had our fair share of insufferable-ness. As did teens before us, and teens before them, and so on and so on. Because let’s face it, teen angst is an integral part of life, likely existing throughout every chapter of human history.
In fact, we have a historical artifact proving just that. In a video recently shared to TikTok, Dr. Esmé James (@dr.esme.louise), whose page is dedicated to (often kinky) history, we learn that recorded evidence of teen angst dates all the way back to ancient Mesopotamia in the form of a letter.
The letter—translated from a clay tablet by A. Leo Oppenheim in Letters from Mesopotamia: Official Business and Private Letters on Clay Tablets from Two Millennia—is, as James explains, “essentially just this brat of a teenage boy complaining to his mother about the quality of his clothing.”
@dr.esme.louise brat anthem of the Ancient World 💚 #KinkyHistory#stitch with @Pat Mandziy Translation: Oppenheim, A. Leo (1967). Letters from Mesopotamia: Official, Business, and Private Letters on Clay Tablets from Two Millennia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. #AncientWorld #History ♬ original sound - Dr. Esmé Louise James
In it, the young man bemoans the fact that “From year to year, the clothes of the young gentlemen here become better,” but mom apparently “let [his] clothes get worse from year to year.”
“Indeed, you persisted in making my clothes poorer and more scanty. At a time when in our house wool is used up like bread, you have made me poor clothes,” he writes. Sick burn, kid.
He then does what all teenagers do…he complains about not having what the cool kids have. “The son of Adad-iddinam, whose father is only an assistant of my father, has two new sets of clothes, while you fuss even about a single set of clothes for me. In spite of the fact that you bore me and his mother only adopted him, his mother loves him, while you, you do not love me!”
As one viewer pointed out, this is more or less the equivalent of “all the kids at school wear Jordans but you make me wear Reeboks, you don’t love me.”
Lastly, the tantrum letter ends with either a 180 turn into politeness, or the most passive aggressive line ever: "May the gods keep you forever in good health…for my sake.”
And this all brings James to her very astute conclusion, that “humans have always been human. The centuries may separate us, but brattiness remains.”
Down in the comments, people had a good chuckle, particularly at the fact that this was no willy nilly angry text. The kiddo had to literally chisel this letter out. Talk about commitment.
“Carved into STONE. Boy was fuming,” one person quipped.
Another echoed, “he immortalized his angst on a TABLET OF STONE.”
Goes to show how “kids these days” will never be a phrase that goes out of style. And of course, it shines a light on what our own parents probably had to deal with during our teen years. Maybe they weren’t so terrible after all. And for the parents currently in the throes of raising teens…just remember that you probably were just as ridiculous once upon a time. Godspeed.