Divje Babe I, near Cerkno, Slovenia
The Divje Babe bone
About 60,000 to 50,000 years, in the museum account (a bear bone with holes, flute or teeth)
A cave-bear bone with round holes in a line was found in 1995 next to a hearth in a Slovenian bear cave. The museum calls it a Neanderthal flute, 11.4 centimetres long. Experiments with carnivore teeth say a bite would have split the shaft first. A 1998 reading says the holes are teeth anyway.
Why this is extraordinary
In 1995, during excavations in Divje Babe I, a cave under the northeastern edge of the Šebrelje plateau, 230 metres above the Idrijca, a piece of bone came out of the breccia next to a hearth. It is the left femur shaft of a young cave bear. The National Museum of Slovenia, where it is inventory number D.b. 652, calls it a flute, dates the layer to about 60,000 to 50,000 years ago, and gives the length as 11.4 centimetres. The museum counts four pierced holes, two well preserved and two damaged. The photograph shows the two clean holes. The ends are ragged, which is where the damaged holes would have to be. The cave was a bear den that people, first Neanderthals and later modern humans, visited now and then. If a person made the holes, the only people in that layer are Neanderthals.
The argument is the holes. They lie on the midline of the shaft, in a straight line. One programme of experiments drove metal casts of wolf, hyena, and bear teeth into fresh brown-bear femurs, 29 juvenile and 4 adult. The report of that work says a carnivore would split a shaft like this before it punched two or more holes in a line, and that hyena carnassials leave oval or rhomboid holes, not these circles. Hyena is not in the fauna of the cave. The same report says replicas of stone and bone tools from the Mousterian levels can punch matching holes without leaving the usual cut marks. Gnawing, on that account, is real at the broken ends, and it happened after the holes.
The other reading, set out in 1998, is that the holes are tooth punctures, the sort a bear den produces by the hundred, and that two of them are what a canine does to a juvenile shaft. A den full of bear bones is the place where punctures are expected. A hearth nearby is the place where a person is expected. The bone sits between those two expectations. The museum’s phrase “the oldest musical instrument in the world” is the instrument reading stated at full strength. It is not a finding this room adopts. No sky reading, no calendar count of the holes, is published in the sources used here.
Why it matters
If the holes were made on purpose, Neanderthals made music, and the instrument is older than any flute accepted from later humans. If the holes are punctures, the bone is a bear cub’s femur in a den, and the hearth is a neighbour, not a workshop.
The photograph is the bone on its mount. The cave is not shown. The pin is Divje Babe I.
Photo tour
1 photograph, unedited. On a phone, swipe the row. Choose one to look closely.
What is still unexplained
These sit beside the consensus account, with the same visual weight. None of them is marked solved.
Location and dating
- Location
- Divje Babe I, below the Šebrelje plateau near Cerkno, 230 metres above the Idrijca. The pin is 46.113 north, 13.915 east.
- Period label
- Current consensus — open to revision Middle Paleolithic. The museum places the layer at about 60,000 to 50,000 years ago, beside a hearth. The bone is a cave-bear cub’s femur.
- How this dating was done
- The age is the layer’s, from the museum account of the excavation, not a date printed on the bone in the sources used here. The hole test is experiment, set against the fauna list. People in the layer are identified as Neanderthals by the tools and the period, which is typology and stratigraphy.
- What could change it
- A direct date on the femur, published beside the hearth’s date, would show they are the same visit. A bite experiment on cave-bear cub bone, not brown-bear bone, with the force of a real jaw, would meet the metal-cast objection.
What is actually there
- Found in 1995, inventory D.b. 652, length 11.4 centimetres.
- Left femur shaft of a young cave bear.
- Museum count: four holes, two preserved and two damaged.
- Experiments used 29 juvenile and 4 adult fresh brown-bear femurs.
- Hyena is not in the cave’s fauna.
- No published sky reading of the holes.
Open questions
| Question | Status |
|---|---|
| Did a person punch the holes, or did a tooth? | Open. The alignment and the piercing tests support a tool. The den and the 1998 reading support a carnivore. The ends are damaged either way. |
| If it is a flute, what scale did it play? | Open. Musical trials on replicas are published by the instrument side. A scale is only meaningful after the holes are accepted as made. |
The current narrative
Where publication stands today. It is the best-supported reading, and it is open to revision. It is not a verdict.
The current narrative — open to revision
Tooth holes in a bear cub’s femur
The holes are carnivore punctures on a juvenile cave-bear bone in a den. The hearth shows people visited. It does not show that they made a flute.
What supports this
- A 1998 reading took the two complete holes as canine punctures.
- Bear dens produce gnawed and punctured shafts as a matter of course.
- The ends of this bone are damaged in the way gnawing damages bone.
What pushes back
- The piercing experiments say a shaft splits before two or more midline holes appear, and hyena holes look different.
- Hyena is not in the fauna, so that particular tooth is not available.
- A straight line of holes next to a hearth is a lot to give to chance.
What would settle it
It is the current narrative wherever a den and a puncture are the ordinary explanation, and wherever a single aligned bone is not enough for the oldest music. The experiments are why it does not get to rest.
Emerging narratives
Other published readings. Each may be right. None is adopted here unless the evidence carries it.
An emerging narrative
A Neanderthal flute
A person in the Mousterian layer punched the holes with stone and bone tools, on purpose, in a line, and the result is a musical instrument. Carnivores chewed the ends later.
What supports this
- Four holes are described on the midline, which is a poor match to a random bite.
- Piercing tests on 33 fresh femurs did not reproduce that line, and hyena is absent from the fauna.
- The bone lay in breccia next to a hearth, in a layer the museum dates to about 60,000 to 50,000 years ago.
What pushes back
- The cave is a bear den. Punctured cub bones are what dens contain.
- A method said to leave no cut marks cannot be separated, by marks, from no tool at all.
- Metal casts and brown-bear bone are not a cave bear’s jaw on a cave-bear cub.
What would settle it
The museum states it as established. This room does not. The experiments are the strongest part, and the den is the strongest objection.
Should the current view be reevaluated?
Open to revision
The bone, the two clear holes, the hearth, and the bear cave are all real. The flute reading has experiments that the bite reading has to answer. The bite reading has a den, which the flute reading has to answer. Neither experiment was a cave bear biting this femur.
What drives this
- Two clean holes in a line, and a museum count of four.
- Piercing tests on 33 fresh femurs, and a 1998 canine reading.
- A hearth in a bear den, dated by the layer to about 60,000 to 50,000 years.
This is the museum’s own weighing of the evidence. It is not a visitor vote, and it is separate from the slider.
Weigh it yourself
Anonymous. Nothing here is stored except on this browser. Your lean does not change the assessment beside it.
Visitor lean so far — not evidence. On this browser only; a shared tally is not collected.
If the contested reading is right
What would follow if a reading that is not the consensus turned out to be true, and what could settle it. This explains the stakes. It does not adopt the reading.
The holes were punched for music
Neanderthals made a pitched instrument in a Slovenian cave about 50,000 to 60,000 years ago, before the flutes usually accepted from later humans.
Why it is still worth a test
A bite trial on cave-bear cub bone, and a direct date on this femur next to the hearth.
Sources
- Neanderthal flute, National Museum of Slovenia National Museum of Slovenia
- Experimental research on the Divje Babe musical instrument EXARC Journal
- A critical review of the Divje Babe discussion Applied Sciences
Image credits
- The bone in the National Museum of Slovenia. Two round holes sit in a line on the shaft. Both ends are broken. The museum counts four holes, two of them damaged, and gives the length as 11.4 centimetres. The damaged pair are not two more clean circles in this frame. . Thilo Parg, CC BY-SA 3.0. Shown unedited.