Background

There is a fine archaeological record that demonstrates musical instruments being made far back into the Stone Age. Wind, percussion, and string instruments all date back this far into antiquity. The oldest known instruments are flutes made from the bones of birds, some of which date back as far as 35,000 years (Conard, Malina, & Münzel, 2009). We can wonder what a prehistoric man or woman might have played on one of these flutes, looking across a primordial forest landscape from the mouth of a cave, but we will never know. However, reconstructions of these flutes show that notes representing octave equivalence were present. This suggests that music has been a part of human culture for as long as humans have had culture.

Go to the next tab to view a video about these ancient flutes and hear a reconstructed flute played.

Flute Clip