Stone Age bone flute discovered in southern Germany

[Beorn]

Stone Age bone flute discovered in southern Germany



http://www.dw-world.de/image/0,,4429868_4,00.jpg


The find proves that Stone Age humans had a highly developed musical culture, wrote Nicholas Conard, an archeologist from the University of Tuebingen in the British journal "Nature."

Largely intact, the flute had been constructed from the hollow wing bone of a giant vulture using stone tools, according to the study.
Nearly 22 centimeters long (8.7 inches), the instrument roughly resembles its modern equivalent. Five holes were carved into it to alter the pitch.

Fragments of three ivory flutes were uncovered at the same site, in the Ach Valley in southern Germany, along with other instruments that are not quite so old.

Previously, a carved figurine from the same period had been discovered just a few steps from the cave where the instruments were found, suggesting that culture was important to the people who lived in the region during the Upper Palaeolithic period (approximately 40,000-10,000 years ago).

The bone and ivory flutes were dated using radiocarbon dating techniques; they are some 5,000 years older than the previously oldest known instruments.

"Upper Palaeolithic music could have contributed to the maintenance of large social networks, and thereby have helped facilitate the demographic and territorial expansion of modern humans" compared to the more "culturally conservative" and isolated Neanderthals, Conard said, as reported by AFP news agency.

No concrete evidence has been found that Neanderthals were also active musicians. While Upper Palaeolithic people are considered modern humans, Neanderthals are classified as either a subspecies or a separate species.




Source (http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4429796,00.html)

[Birka]

Possible ancestors of Ian Anderson?

[Thorum]

Here is another news source with the story (http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/06/24/1976108.aspx). This one also has an audio clip (http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/Components/audio/2009/2009-june/090624-flute.mp3) of a reconstructed flute so you can hear what it actually sounded like. Pretty cool.

Music for cavemen (http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/06/24/1976108.aspx)
Posted: Wednesday, June 24, 2009 2:45 PM by Alan Boyle


http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/090624-bone-flute-coslog-11a.jpg


Daniel Maurer / AP



Click for audio (http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/Components/audio/2009/2009-june/090624-flute.mp3): The University of Tubingen's Nicholas Conard holds an ancient bone flute during a news conference. Click on the [audio link above] to hear music played on a reconstructed flute, courtesy of Wulf Hein and the University of Tubingen.



Scientists say they've found what they consider to be the earliest handcrafted musical instrument in a cave in southwest Germany, less than a yard away from the oldest-known carving of a human. The flute fragments as well as the ivory figurine of a "prehistoric Venus" date back more than 35,000 years, the researchers report.
The findings, published online today by the journal Nature, suggest not only that cavemen and cavewomen could rock the house, but that musical jam sessions may have helped modern humans prevail over their Neanderthal cousins.
"The bottom-line issues are demographics, but behind the demographics are other factors," said Nicholas Conard, an archaeologist at the University of Tubingen and the Nature paper's lead author.
Researchers know that modern humans prevailed over Neanderthals in Europe 20,000 to 35,000 years ago, and that the principal factors behind the Neanderthals' disappearance probably included culture and climate as well as diet. Conard and his colleagues - Maria Malina of the Heidelberg Academy of Science and Susanne Munzel of the University of Tubingen - argue that the musical tradition fostered by Homo sapiens may have contributed by bonding communities more closely together.
"Modern humans seemed to have had much larger social networks," Conard told me today. That networking may have helped facilitate "the demographic and territorial expansion of modern humans relative to culturally more conservative and demographically more isolated Neanderthal populations," he and his colleagues wrote.
The fact that multiple musical instruments turned up in the same area, not far from other artistic artifacts, strengthens the argument that Paleolithic humans developed a relatively rich culture, the researchers say.
Four flutes found
In all, researchers report finding the fragments of four flutes at two excavations in an area of southwestern Germany known as Swabia. Three of the sets of fragments were carved from mammoth ivory, but the real prize is a nearly complete flute hollowed out from the bone of a griffon vulture. That specimen was found in the Hohle Fels cave, just 28 inches (70 centimeters) away from the spot where the prehistoric Venus (or, as some wags have put it, "prehistoric porn") was found.
The figurine's discovery was announced in May, but both finds were actually made last September. "First came the Venus, and a couple of weeks later came the flutes," Conard said.
When assembled, the vulture-bone flute is about eight and a half inches long (21.8 centimeters long) and boasts five finger holes. There are fine lines cut into the bone around the holes, suggesting that the flute's maker was calibrating the holes' placement to produce the nicest tones. One end of the flute is cut into a V shape, and the musician probably blew into that side of the flute. The researchers assume that an inch or two of the flute's far end is missing.
You can hear what the flute might have sounded like in this MP3 audio clip.
Conard noted that the fragments of eight flutes have now been found in Swabian geological deposits dating back 30,000 to 40,000 years - deposits known as the Aurignacian layer. Radiocarbon dating indicated that the newly found fragments fit into that time frame, and other dating methods led the researchers to conclude that the flutes were more than 35,000 years old.
They said there were no "convincing" claims that any older musical instruments have ever been discovered.
Reviewing the evidence
Actually, other researchers have pointed to a bear-bone fragment that is about 50,000 years old and appears to have the finger holes for a flute. I wrote about that particular specimen nine years ago in a story on the "sounds of science." But there's still a controversy over whether the holes were made by a Neanderthal or by a bone-chomping scavenger.
"No [outside] scholar who has ever studied it has ever confirmed it's a flute," Conard told me. The scientists who discovered the bear bone have stood by their story, however.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/547000/547058.jpg



This bear bone specimen was found in Slovenia in 1995. Is it a 50,000-year-old flute? Such claims have spawned controversy.



Conard said his team's conclusions about the flute found in the Hohle Fels cave are on much more solid ground. "It's a totally different situation here," he said. "We're dealing with finds that have all kinds of indications of cutting with tools and polishing."
The research also meshes with the story told by other finds like the prehistoric Venus. Taken together, the evidence points to a flowering of culture that took place around 35,000 B.C. Could it be that prehistoric partygoers brought their flutes as well as their figurines to the same cave rave?
"It's possible," Conard said. "Let's put it this way: If that were the case, you would find the situation that we have. On the other hand, we can't be sure how much time is represented by the [geological] layer. Let's say that your grandfather played the flute, and your great-granddaughter made the Venus. But it's got to be the same general time period."

:thumbs up

[Beorn]

It was like listening in on history, and reminds me of those quiet sombre moments who get in Barbarian movies :D Cheers for the update, Thorum.

For some reason it also reminded me of Parc de Préhistoire de Bretagne (http://www.prehistoire-bretagne.com/index2.php) which had some lovely views of the surrounding countryside and some very unrealistic looking Dinosaurs. But it also had a section where they explained the history of music, although I couldn't make out certain parts of the presentation and boards as my French was very basic back then.

[Thorum]

It was like listening in on history, and reminds me of those quiet sombre moments who get in Barbarian movies :D Cheers for the update, Thorum.

For some reason it also reminded me of Parc de Préhistoire de Bretagne (http://www.prehistoire-bretagne.com/index2.php) which had some lovely views of the surrounding countryside and some very unrealistic looking Dinosaurs. But it also had a section where they explained the history of music, although I couldn't make out certain parts of the presentation and boards as my French was very basic back then.


I have great reverence and love for music and to listen to the clip it was almost eerie. I suppose it is as close as we can get to hearing an ancient voice, no? :thumbs up

[Allenson]

Yeah, this is great stuff and fun to listen to. Thanks for the audio link, Thorum.

Hmmm, the oldest known musical instrument lying near to the oldest known carved human figurine....both in Europe.... The mind wonders what there is to this. ;)

[Lenny]

Yeah, this is great stuff and fun to listen to. Thanks for the audio link, Thorum.

Hmmm, the oldest known musical instrument lying near to the oldest known carved human figurine....both in Europe.... The mind wonders what there is to this. ;)
One of the most humbling things I have ever learned is the fact that Cro-Magnon man 30,000 years ago was a good deal smarter than his descendants - us. If you base IQ on brain case size (which correlates with the Oriental-European-African of today), European Cro-Magnons 30kya would have had an average raw IQ perhaps as high as 120. Agriculture and other dysgenic developments have caused us to decline a good deal.


Think how hard it would be to invent music if one never had it to begin with. I mean, apes of today inventing music and passing it down generation to generation? Ridiculous!

It'd require a very high level of intelligence to say the least.

[Thorum]

Think how hard it would be to invent music if one never had it to begin with. I mean, apes of today inventing music and passing it down generation to generation? Ridiculous!

It'd require a very high level of intelligence to say the least.

An excellent example of "apes" inventing music and passing it down is the article itself. Music was invented and passed down by our ancestors to us, modern apes.

;)

[Lenny]

An excellent example of "apes" inventing music and passing it down is the article itself. Music was invented and passed down by our ancestors to us, modern apes.

;)

Heh, after reading the first seven words of your post, I was sure a reference to Rap Music was imminent. :eek: :D Alas, not to be.



Needless to say, the men who fashioned that flute were no apes but a good deal smarter than us (on average).

[Thorum]

Needless to say, the men who fashioned that flute were no apes....(on average).

You are right, I used the wrong term. They were primates as are humans.

[Äike]

One of the most humbling things I have ever learned is the fact that Cro-Magnon man 30,000 years ago was a good deal smarter than his descendants - us. If you base IQ on brain case size (which correlates with the Oriental-European-African of today), European Cro-Magnons 30kya would have had an average raw IQ perhaps as high as 120. Agriculture and other dysgenic developments have caused us to decline a good deal.


Think how hard it would be to invent music if one never had it to begin with. I mean, apes of today inventing music and passing it down generation to generation? Ridiculous!

It'd require a very high level of intelligence to say the least.

Cro-Magnon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cro-Magnon)

Cro-Magnon were anatomically modern, only differing from their modern day descendants in Europe by their more robust physiology and slightly larger cranial capacity. Of modern nationalities, Finns are closest to Cro-Magnons in terms of anthropological measurements.

This must be one of the reasons why Finns are smarter then most Europeans;)