Prehistoric music
Prehistoric music (previously primitive music) is all music produced in preliterate cultures (prehistory), beginning somewhere in very late geological history. Prehistoric music is followed by Ancient music in most of Europe (1500 BCE) and later musics in subsequent European-influenced areas, but still exists in isolated areas.
Origin of music
The origin of music likely stems from natural sounds and rhythms: the human heartbeat, the songs of birds, the rustling of wind through trees, the crackle of a burning fire and the sounds of waves breaking on a beach or bubbles in a brook. Man-made music echoes these soundscapes using patterns, repetition and tonality.
Aside from the bird song, it should be noted that music is not entirely the field of humankind. Monkeys have been witnessed to beat on hollow logs. Although this might serve some purpose of territorialism, it suggests a degree of creativity and seems to incorporate a call and response dialogue. See: zoomusicology.
It is most likely that the first musical instrument was the human voice itself, which can make a vast array of sounds, from singing, humming and whistling (more musical forms) through to clicking, coughing and yawning (less musical).
Most likely the first instruments were percussion instruments, the clapping of hands, stones hit together, or other things that are useful to create rhythm.
Music can be theoretically traced to prior to the Oldowan era of the Paleolithic age, the anthropological and archeological designation that suggests when stone tools first began to be used by hominids. The noises produced by work such as pounding seed and roots into meal was one source of early rhythm created by early humans that was likely to register in the collective consciousness.
Prehistoric music varies greatly in style, function, general relation to culture, and complexity. The Timbila music of the Chopi is considered one of the most complex preliterate musics.
The oldest flutes
The oldest flute found is believed to be the so-called Neanderthal flute that was dug up in Slovenia in 1995 in the cave Divje Babe I (Idrijca Valley, Western Slovenia) by the Slovenian paleontologist dr. Ivan Turk of Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (SAZU). It is estimated to be about 45,000 years old and was found in the fifth mousterian level (middle paleolithic). The flute was made of a hollow bear femur and has four holes, two of which are intact and two of which are incomplete, in a straight alignment. It can not be played anymore.
There remains plenty of place for speculation about its origin until the conclusive evidence is found. On the basis of experiments, it is easier to demonstrate the hypothesis of an artificial (human) than a natural (carnivore) origin of the holes. The holes in a flute are aligned in a spacing that is consistent with that required to produce the diatonic scale. No animal has teeth spaced in this fashion and animals normally turn bones as they gnaw on them making carnivore-induced, aligned holes less likely.
However, at the time at which it was made, neither the technology of working bones nor the necessary artistic (symbolic) behaviour are supposed to have been developed, although weak signals exist for both, the number of which is gradually increasing with new finds. The neanderthal man was perhaps intellectually closer to modern humans than has previously been accepted.
In 1999 several flutes were found in Jiahu in Henan Province, China. They date to about 9,000 BC. They have between 5 and 8 holes each and were made from a hollow bone of a bird, the red-crowned crane. At the time of the discovery, one was found to be still playable. The bone flute plays both the five or seven-notes scale of Xia Zhi and six-notes scale of Qing Shang of the ancient Chinese musical system.
See also
External links
- Information about neanderthal flute found in Slovenia - the article written by dr. Ivan Turk who discovered it.
Further reading
- Nettl, Bruno (1956). Music in Primitive Culture. Harvard University Press.