New discovery: Humans playing the flute for at least 35,000 years, page 1

Carved flutes dating back some 35,000 years were discovered during a dig last summer at an Upper Paleolithic site in southwestern Germany, making them among—if not the—oldest documented musical instruments, reports a study published today in Nature (Scientific American is part of the Nature Publishing Group).

These flutes, from the Early Aurignacian period, show that there was "a well-established musical tradition at the time when modern humans colonized Europe," write the study authors from the University of Tübingen. The most complete, five-holed flute is made of bone from griffon vultures and is about 8.6 inches (21.8 centimeters) long. Other flute fragments are ivory.

www.scientificamerican.com...

Yet more compelling evidence that our ancestors where much smarter than generally believed.

Creating and playing a flute requires some level of skill that most humans even today would not be able to do.

Surprise, surprise.



[edit on 24-6-2009 by warrenb]

reply to post by warrenb

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Hiya, your threads tend to have a focus on proving that our earlier ancestors were intelligent and adaptable to technology. Have you noticed that everyone that replies already accepts that information? This isn't a criticism, just an observation that you're 'preaching to the converted.' Personally, I'm always happy to see A&LC getting new and interesting threads.

Flutes and instruments have been known about for some years. The Neanderthal 'flute' fragment is dated to around 35kya also. Despite the possibility that the holes are teeth marks, I favor the flute identification. There's a VERY extensive article that involved reconstructing the 'flute'...NEANDERTHAL FLUTE Oldest Musical Instrument's 4 Notes Matches 4 of Do, Re, Mi Scale. I'll be honest, I don't know enough to know what it was, I just prefer the flute idea.

There's a fairly interesting paper about whether Neanderthals and early humans sung...it makes the interesting point about rhythm...

Among singing primates, rhythm is unique to humans (Geissmann, 2000). As we explain next, this signature feature of music could be accounted for by a correspondingly unique aspect of human territorial defense and a consequent group-analog of sexual selection.

Did Neanderthals and Early Humans Sing?

It's hard to imagine how the first guys made the connection between blowing through an old bear leg bone and then drilling holes to make notes. Sound and music would be very important during 'downtime' and probably helped to unite populations. I read recently that some areas in caves we used have a higher amount of red ochre in areas of higher resonance. They could have been humming or chanting in the same way as medieval monks in churches.

One thing I'd bet the farm on is that their tunes were fairly awful! I'm thinking a warm up by infants in recorder practice at school

reply to post by warrenb

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Interesting article. I do think that music and singing are very old indeed. Whales and other creatures do a form of singing, so why should it be considered relatively new?

reply to post by Majestic23

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There's a lot of theories about how we became more intelligent than our primate cousins and everything else. One of them is 'the Great Leap Forward,' that suggests there was a gene mutation that swept populations and appeared around 50kya. It's probably the most widely accepted theory. Others think that we simply developed by trial and error. I prefer the latter idea. We've been using tools for ten times longer than the 50kya date. We've had communication for even longer...the advent of sophisticated language would be a massive help to our survival. It's just hard to say if it was a sudden development or gradual...

This site is worth a look and has video, narrative etc...Atlas of the Human Journey. It helps to get an idea of the ages it took for us to develop and migrate across the lands.

I think our distant ancestors were planning ahead, using tools and communicating very early. We aren't alone in using tools or planning ahead...monkeys and chimps exhibit all this behavior...



Monkey tool usage: Monkey tool usage: Hammer and Anvil

Notice that they use tools and plan ahead by having piles of stones to throw at the jaguar.



It might just be a matter of time before we see footage of chimpanzees with rhythm!

reply to post by pieman
You're more than likely right. Observation and experience combine to create the flute. Everything we know was an idea someone had that appealed to everyone else...

EDIT to add link for YT being awkward

[edit on 24-6-2009 by Kandinsky]

Hey, that flute sure would go quite well with my mini-movie transcript.

Mind if I borrow it for a sec?

Basically, it's about how early Man used musical instruments to send the aliens underground.

link here

Click here for more information.

reply to post by Kandinsky

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I think you hit on an interesting idea. Yes, they had musical instruments...but were they to make pretty music, or for another purpose? Let me explain...

The red ochre in the caves was used to signify areas where specific sounds were achieved. Like a resonant type of harmony was created with a drum beat or something, and was used by the shaman to enter a trance like state so he could do whatever it was he was doing (seeing the future, for example).

The rhythmic pounding is known to induce a trance, and specific rhythms work better, especially depending on the resonant frequency created in each specific area.

So, my thought is, would these flutes, etc, possibly been used in the same way? Could spiritual use have been the Genesis for musical capability?

I would be interested to see the frequencies that these instruments were playing at. What notes, etc?

Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
reply to post by Kandinsky

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I think you hit on an interesting idea. Yes, they had musical instruments...but were they to make pretty music, or for another purpose? Let me explain...

The red ochre in the caves was used to signify areas where specific sounds were achieved. Like a resonant type of harmony was created with a drum beat or something, and was used by the shaman to enter a trance like state so he could do whatever it was he was doing (seeing the future, for example).

The rhythmic pounding is known to induce a trance, and specific rhythms work better, especially depending on the resonant frequency created in each specific area.

So, my thought is, would these flutes, etc, possibly been used in the same way? Could spiritual use have been the Genesis for musical capability?

I would be interested to see the frequencies that these instruments were playing at. What notes, etc?

I might agree. My wife and I studied early music and the ancient shamanic uses since university in the 80's. We studied the "Raga" as a transforming musi-gen.

I might have read about early flute, but mostly drumming trances induced through rhythmic redundancy. Flutes do regulate breathing in the playing, and as such can alter the users awareness through that, but I don't have direct reference for the flute in altering states of consciousness.

Remember the myth of the Pied Piper?

A good book on the subject is "Through Music to the Self"by Peter Michael Hamel. He talks about masters on Tablas coming down from the hills and playing to huge crowds, eliciting profound emotional and transformative states and reducing hundreds to tears from the shear mastery and amazing drumming. You never hear recordings of this. These are shamans /yogi musicians who shun such meaningless fame. They play for spiritual connections and are unmatched masters.

In the Indian culture such musical art is a spiritual path and practice. The same for flute and other instruments there in a correctly educated society.

I can only imagine what a connected spirit can do with a flute. Rampal would dim in comparison. No lack of respect for Rampal, just the intent is more my flavor of choice.

ZG

reply to post by Kandinsky

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I remember the original article in "nature" about the neanderthal musical instruments, there wasnt only a flute but several other items that may have been musical as well.
There is a reeally good documentary, i think it was called "the history of music" hosted by stewart copeland of "The Police".
he travelled around the world in search of the origins of music, and he visitid a place in kenya? where there is a huge iron/nickle meteorite sticking out of the ground. The thing is big, the size of a small building and for eons people have come to it to bang on it and make music.
There are spots on it that correspond to different tones, and they have been pounded on so long there are divots in the iron/nickle of the meteorite. It was a preety cool sight to see a couple of dozen people sitting on the rock banging away at it making music
One of the other things i learned is that rythym based music has its origins in africa, compared to asian music which is tone based.

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