In Nature for September 23 is a report of the examination of some musical instruments recovered from an early Neolithic burial site at Jiahu in Henan Province in China. Occupation of the site is calculated to have been from 7000 to 5700 BC. The excavation layer from which the instruments were retrieved was radiocarbon dated to 7700 to 9000 years before present.
The finds were six complete flutes of the vertically held type, with the fragments of some 30 more. They were made from the ulnae of the red-crowned crane and showed five, six, seven or eight finger holes. The best preserved of the collection had seven holes, and in addition a minute perforation adjacent to the first finger hole, suggestive of an attempt to correct the pitch produced. It was possible to play this instrument and analyse the sound produced. The nature of the intervals indicated that it would have been possible to play not merely isolated notes, but musical themes.
This discovery of an artifact which must have been the product of a complex and highly organised society throws light upon the character of the Neolithic culture of prehistoric China. It is conjectured that music making was part of a ritual setting of some kind. The discovery of bones of some 400 individuals at the excavation site indicates that the ethnic group responsible for the flutes had a north Asian Mongolian origin and was related to later groups living in Henan and in Shandong. It is intriguing to think that a musical activity which we tend to associate with schoolchildren may have such an inconceivably ancient origin.