Chapter 01 of 5
The Oldest Instruments
Flutes carved from bird bones and mammoth ivory, made long before farming or writing.
- The Question
How old is music?
Music leaves few traces. Songs and claps vanish instantly. So how far back can we follow it?
- The Answer
Older than writing
The oldest surviving instruments are tens of thousands of years older than farming, cities or writing.
- The Cave
Hohle Fels
In 2008 archaeologists digging in Hohle Fels cave in southern Germany found pieces of a flute made from a vulture's wing bone.
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Could you answer this?
What was the roughly 40,000-year-old Hohle Fels flute made from?
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🌍 The Song in Every Culture
- 01The Oldest InstrumentsFlutes carved from bird bones and mammoth ivory, made long before farming or writing.
- 02A Universal Language?Every society makes music, but not everyone hears it the same way.
- 03LullabiesWhy every culture sings to babies, and why it works even in a foreign language.
- 04Songs for WorkingSea shanties, weaving songs and why singing together makes hard work easier.
- 05Why We DanceThe urge to move, a dancing cockatoo and a medieval dancing plague.