421.141.22 Stopped single notch flute with fingerholes

Bamboo flute cut from exceptionally long internode and marked at the end in a distinctive V shaped notch. The flute has 3 holes, the upper one for blowing, the bottom two for fingering.

This flute and an example with two finger holes were presented to the Horniman Museum in 1913 by Gunnar Landtman (1878–1940), a Finnish anthropologist. He had recently returned from Papua where he had lived with the Kiwai community for two years. In his catalogue of the collection of the Museum of Finland published in 1933 (p.72), he describes how the flutes were 'mostly blown by boys and young men, as an amuseument or diversion'.

Collection Information

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