26. 5. 2009 Prehistoric flute made of bird bones

The forty thousand year old flute was discovered twelve years ago by archaeologists in the Hohle Fels cave near Schelklingen in southern Germany. It's made of bird bones. Experts say it's proof that music accompanied humans much earlier than they thought.

The flute found in the Hohle Fels cave is the oldest hand-carved musical instrument ever found. According to archaeologist Nicholas Conard, the discovery has a clear message. People of a quarter of a million years ago had a similar anatomy to ours, but only they were able to entertain themselves with music," he said.

The archaeologists originally discovered only twelve fragments from which they assembled the flute. The fragments were scattered close together. The flute is twenty-two centimetres long and 2.2 centimetres in diameter. Thanks to the five holes, different pitches can be played. There are V-shaped holes at each end of the instrument.

"It is clearly the oldest instrument in the world," said Conard, who presented the flute at a press conference in 2009.

Fragments of other flutes have been found in other German caves before. For example, in Vogelherde, 25 kilometres northwest of Ulm, fragments of three flutes carved from mammoth wood.

But according to archaeologist Aprile Nowell, these were "newer" instruments. Another such flute has been found in Austria, for example. Experts have estimated its age at 19,000 years. Twenty-two flutes were discovered by archaeologists in the Pyrenees and are approximately 30,000 years old.

"It is difficult to say how socially advanced people were forty thousand years ago. The finds of musical instruments, jewellery and figurines suggest that they were indeed intellectually comparable to those of today. The communal practice of music may have contributed to a larger social network. This probably gave our ancestors a decisive advantage over Neanderthals," said archaeologist Wil Roebroeks of Leiden University.

The Hohle Fels cave is also famous for the discovery of a famous 35,000-year-old statuette depicting a man, the so-called Venus of Hohle Fels...

Sources: www.thegreenvillesymphony.org, www.sandiegouniontribune.com