A closer look
Long before Instagram and viral trends, an anonymous Mesopotamian merchant started a kind of influencer revolution. Around 2000 BCE, certain clay potters marked their jars with distinctive thumbprints—the earliest 'brand logos.' Shoppers recognized them and followed that maker’s work, just as we follow creators today. Archaeologists uncovered how these imprints built cross-city trade reputations; even counterfeit 'fake thumbprints' appeared centuries later. Commerce and identity were already merging. That tiny swirl pressed into wet clay? It changed how trust and fame spread in growing cities. Branding wasn’t born in Madison Avenue—it was dug from river mud where the first marketplace met human ego.
