From Newsgroup: soc.history.medieval

Thomas Cayne
Writer, painter, thinker, madman. Nov 7
What is the most British gag ever?
The English are fighting the Scots. The English army is camped on a hill waiting for a deep fog to clear. Out of the fog sounds a Scottish voice:

rCLAny one Scotsman can beat any 10 Englishmen.rCY


The English general selects his 10 best men, and sends them down into
the fog. Soon the sound of fighting and screams can be heard but not
much later a silence sets in. No one returns.

One hour later, the voice sounds again:

rCLAny one Scotsman can beat any 100 Englishmen.rCY

The general selects 100 of his strongest soldiers, and send them into
the fog. Soon he hears the sound of fighting and screaming again rCo this
time quite a bit longer rCo but then all sound fades away. No one returns.

One hour later, the same voice sounds again:

rCLAny one Scotsman can beat any battalion of Englishmen.rCY

The English general is now really worried but decides to prepare the
entire battalion and starts advancing into the fog. But a groan is heard
on the ground at their feet.

An English soldier battered to a pulp has managed to crawl back up the
hill, and cries out:

rCLDonrCOt go in rCo itrCOs a trap. THERErCOS TWO OF THE BASTARDS !!rCY

SOURCES: this is a famous English joke. The image was taken from IMDb.

106.4K views504 upvotes7 shares38 comments
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Peter Stillman
-+ Sun
I would have thought it was a famous Scottish joke.

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Edward Huggins
-+ Tue
There so many different versions of that joke

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Kathleen Mortimer
-+ Wed
Yes, it could have been told any other way. Scottish, Welsh, Irish and
be just as funny. We like to make jibes at each other. Except here we
are using age old stereotypes of warrior northern ScottrCOs versus whimp Southern English And as an English joke was requested, the typical
ability of laughing at oneself fits the bill.

Plus the other way around would sound less plausible. There has to be a
slight element of feasibility.
( I am English)


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