Archaelogists Discover World’s Earliest Musical Instruments

Archaeologists recently discovered bone flutes that are at least 35,000 years old, proving that music truly is timeless.

By Kathryn Hawkins. Posted on June 24 2009

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Lots of people enjoy classical music—but if you’re a fan of Mozart sonatas, maybe you’d enjoy a Stone Age symphony even more.

Unfortunately, no recordings exist of our prehistoric musician friends (not even an eight-track), but archaeologists recently discovered a bone flute and fragments of ivory flutes in a cave in Germany, which are estimated to be approximately 35,000 years old. The flutes bear slight resemblance to today’s sleek and shiny instruments, but the researchers claim that the music they made would have sounded just as sweet.

In fact, findings from the cave indicate that our early ancestors were far more artistic than we give them credit for: one of the flutes was found just a few feet away from a sculpture of a nude woman, also about 35,000 years old. Other findings from the area include beautiful carvings in the form of animals. Despite their lack of table manners and propensity for grunting, it appears that our prehistoric relatives had fairly highbrow taste.

While it’s true that their musical leanings and passion for art didn’t help put food on the table (or cave floor, as the case may be), researchers believe that the early Europeans’ creative abilities may have helped them beat out their Neanderthal cousins in the evolutionary scale.

As lead researcher Dr. Nicolas J. Conard wrote in the journal Nature, the early humans’ musical interests “could have contributed to the maintenance of larger social networks, and thereby perhaps have helped facilitate the demographic and territorial expansion of modern humans.”

So, if you’ve got a friend or relative who’s dying to become a rock star, maybe you shouldn’t roll your eyes at his lofty ambitions—after all, if history is any indication, he could be the key to keeping our species alive. (Though only after he finally manages to master the B chord.)

Filed under: Arts and Culture, General Interest, History, Science,

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