Jean-Paul Pune

Monsieur Jean-Paul Pune is credited with the founding of the Fools' Guild in 1567. LIke many others, he came to Ankh-Morpork in search of a better life, that is, one where people were not trying to drown, burn, hang, draw, and quarter him or otherwise injure his person because of the excruciatingly bad jokes he made at home in Quirm. He was looking for people with a better sense of humour, basically, and space to complete his masterwork Essay on a form of wit, which caused the form to be named after him.

He was a wealthy man who felt that humour had to be taken very seriously. To this end, he chose for his new School of Humour a site formerly occupied by a monastery, which despite its prime location next door to the Assassins' Guild did not seem to be attracting any takers. He also petitioned the City's elders for Guild status, which they actually granted, thus seeing the birth of the Guild of Fools, Joculators, Minstrels, Buffoons and Mime Artists.

It is possible the city elders were influenced by the fact that M. Pune was already patron of the Quirme Société Joyeux at La Sorbumme, and decided that rather than import foreign Fools, why not train our own?

The family continues in Quirm. William de Worde corresponded with a Mr Pune, a civic employee there who was described as a "sensible chap, not much imagination". Curiously, not associated with the Fools at all.