This 4000-year-old carving on Babylonian clay tablet is the world’s oldest homework — and of course, it's math

Ask all kids what the most annoying thing about school is, and most would say, 'Homework.' But that's only because they aren't aware of how difficult homework was around 4000 years ago. Yes, that's right! Unlike today, they didn't have paper; in fact, they had to complete their assignments, inscribed on clay tablets. In an intriguing YouTube video, science YouTuber Toby Hendy (@tibees) shared some artifacts of homework from antiquity and explained how to interpret them.

Clay, when baked, becomes hard and can be used to make decorative items. While using clay pottery for home and office décor is a recent trend, it has a long history of use. Science YouTuber Toby Hendy says that clay, in fact, was the first known writing medium. "I find it delightful to be able to look at ancient clay tablets from the Babylonians, 4000 years ago. Many of them are mathematical and show an amazing level of knowledge and accuracy," she added.

Hendy further said that the scribes were taught to inscribe the information onto the clay in schools called edubas, according to Open Culture. Basically, the students who were assigned those assignments were learning to write in Sumerian and handle the administrative tasks needed to run the empire. "What's great is that it's actually not too hard to read these tablets for ourselves," Hendy shared. Moving on, she talked about how, first, the numbers are marked in the clay with a wedged tool, and shared the symbols used to denote mathematical numbers. Surprisingly, the maths done years ago used base 60 instead of base 10, as used today.

Even though education wasn't widespread at that time, it's shocking that their understanding of math and writing was so advanced. Meanwhile, reacting to the video, @morgow1 commented, "I just can't wrap my head around how they could do this level of math before they discovered the easy concept of numbers as they are today." Similarly, a person who goes by @einsofquester on YouTube said, "It's amazing that the Babylonians 4000 years ago had a base-centered numbering system, as we have today with our base ten system, but the Romans 2000 years later were using clumsy Roman numerals."

Another user, @reghunt2487, commented, "It makes you wonder how much of our civilization will survive the next couple of thousand years. Not only will all paper and film and tape probably be disintegrated, but anything purely digital will probably be irretrievable. Though I'm convinced there will be a society dedicated to preserving Beatles records."

@richardreinertson1335 wrote, "I mean, it is OBVIOUS that these ancient folks HAD to know a LOT about mathematics and geometry to construct the buildings they constructed. People in those days were JUST as smart as we are and had thousands of years to build up their knowledge. What makes the difference between now and then is political history. So MUCH was lost because of societal instability. As societal stability improved, societal knowledge retention also improved. I mean, just think about how much was lost because of the destruction of the library at Alexandria. It almost brings me to tears to think about it."

You can follow Tibees (@tibees) on YouTube for more educational content.

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