 The first known Bellman joke appears in the preface to an 1835 collection of Bellman's works, in which the publisher reprints an 1808 letter from a contemporary of Bellman, containing the following anecdote.19th-century Bellman jokes tended to focus on C. M. Bellman's life at court, and often contained sexual humour.Since then, however, the Bellman character of the jokes has changed into a generic Swede, rather than the historical figure.