A research assistant shows the 35,000-year-old bone flute to journalists in the southern German city of Tuebingen on June 25. The flute, made from the wing bone of a vulture, is said to be the oldest known musical instrument.

PARIS – Stone Age humans may have ripped raw meat from the bone with their teeth but they also played music, according to a study reporting the discovery of a 35,000-year-old flute, the oldest instrument known.

Found in the Ach Valley of southern Germany, the nearly intact five-hole flute was meticulously carved with stone tools from the hollow wing-bone of a giant vulture, says the study, published on June 25 in the British journal Nature.

Fragments from three ivory flutes unearthed at the same site, along with nearby instruments not quite as old, suggest that humans who had then only recently migrated to the Upper Danube enjoyed a rich musical culture.

Indeed, the area within the cave that yielded the flutes reveals a veritable artist’s atelier.

There is debris from the flint tools used to chip the instruments; traces of worked bone and ivory from mammoth, horse, reindeer and bear; and burnt bone, one of the ingredients – along with minerals, charcoal, blood and animal fats – used by Stone Age humans for cave painting.

“We can now conclude that music played an important role in Aurignacian life in the Ach and Lone valleys,” said Nicholas Conard, a professor at the University of Tubingen and lead author of the study.

Aurignacian culture flourished in western Europe during what is known as the Upper Palaeolithic period, from about 40,000 to 10,000 years ago.

The bone flute, part of a treasure trove of artifacts uncovered at the Hohle Fels Cave, was found in 12 pieces scattered over an area the size of a large plate.
There are two deep, V-shaped notches carved into the end into which the musician blew.

Conard reports that a playable replica of the flute has not yet been made, but says it is likely to produce a range of notes comparable to many modern types of flute.

The technique for making the ivory flutes – of which only a few fragments remain – is far more complicated, says the study.

First the craftsman would have hewn the rough shape of the instrument from a solid, naturally curved piece of tusk. Then the piece of ivory was split lengthwise, the halves hollowed out, and the holes carved.

Finally the two halves of the flute were rejoined with some kind of glue to form an air-tight seal.

Using radiocarbon dating techniques, Conard calculated that the newly discovered bone and ivory flutes were made at least 35,000 years ago, pushing back the age of the oldest known instrument by some 5000 years.

Conard speculates that late Stone Age music did not contribute directly to the evolutionary success of the first modern humans.

But it may have given them a slight edge over neighbouring Neanderthals, who died out even as Homo sapiens flourished.

“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, he said.

Scientists have long speculated that Neanderthals played music too, but no evidence of their musicality has been found so far.