page_title: Toynbee tiles
section_title: People and things referred to
hierarchical_section_title: Toynbee tiles / Interpretations / People and things referred to
caption_attribution_description: Toynbee tile photographed a block or so from the White House by en:User:Erifnam in 2002.
context_page_description: The Toynbee tiles are messages of unknown origin found embedded in asphalt of streets in about two dozen major cities in the United States and four South American cities. Since the 1980s, several hundred tiles have been discovered. They are generally about the size of an American license plate, but sometimes considerably larger. They contain some variation of the following inscription:
  TOYNBEE IDEA
  IN MOViE '2001
  RESURRECT DEAD
  ON PLANET JUPiTER
  Some of the more elaborate tiles also feature cryptic political statements or exhort readers to create and install similar tiles of their own. The material used for making the tiles was initially unknown, but evidence has emerged that they may be primarily made of layers of linoleum and asphalt crack-filling compound. Articles about the tiles began appearing in the mid-1990s, though references may have started to appear in the mid-1980s.
context_section_description: In a documentary film about the tiles, Justin Duerr assumes that "Toynbee" refers to the 20th century British historian Arnold J. Toynbee, and that "Kubrick's 2001" is a reference to the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, a film co-written and directed by filmmaker Stanley Kubrick, about a manned mission to Jupiter. The toynbee.net website speculates that Toynbee refers to Ray Bradbury's short story "The Toynbee Convector".
  The majority of tiles contain text similar to that above, although a second set is often found nearby. Several of these allude to a mass conspiracy between the press (including newspaper magnate John S. Knight of Knight-Ridder), the U.S. government, the USSR (including tiles seemingly made years after the Soviet Union's dissolution), and "hellion Jews".
  A tile that used to be located in Santiago de Chile mentions a street address: 2624 S. 7th Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The current occupants of the house know nothing about the tiles and are annoyed by people who ask,
  though this is the former residence of a named recluse and alleged tile-maker, as shown in the 2011 documentary film Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles. Toynbee-tile enthusiasts believe that a native Philadelphian created the Toynbee tiles because of the large number that appear in the city, their apparent age, the variety of carving styles, the presence of the "tile creator's screed," and the Philadelphia address on the Santiago tile.
caption: Commonly, a city will have a couple of large and colorful tiles along with numerous small and simple tiles like this one, just a block from the White House.
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