The flute is the oldest manufactured instrument, from hollow bones 40,000 years ago

Evidence

The flute is the earliest known manufactured musical instrument. Hollow bones 30,000 or 40,000 years old with purpose-drilled toneholes have been unearthed. There are hundreds of variants from as many cultures. They are all essentially an open tube with air blown across a large opening near one end, and toneholes for producing various notes (figure 16.27). — Eric J. Heller, Why You Hear What You Hear- An…, 1568

Categorization

• CANDY: A light party fact: the earliest known musical instrument is a drilled hollow bone, tens of millennia old.