In researching the history of musical instruments, I discovered that many distant cultures independently developed hunting bows and it is believed these are the original of stringed instruments.
So, the concept of a taught string bound to a resonating body, simple as it is may have been a precursor.
It is possible gourds where used as mounting points on some of the contraptions, and the ability of hollow spaces to resonate was probably already known... which leads to Capoeira-like instruments...
but the next leap of getting the thing to pick up voice is imo a larger conceptual leap. Of course, by then, written language was widespread and ideas could maintain a bit more momentum...
Yet still, notice how the bottom of the cup is of a different material and not tightly coupled to the rest of the cup. It's attached with a woven or knitted "sock." That's where energy leaves the system instead of bouncing energy back into the twine like bows. That's a great conceptual leap, considering it's not totally obvious to most people today how the bridge of stringed instrument works :)
I imagine they had built large string and hollow-body resonator combinations...
Yet it's yet another step to make it "input-"sensitive to human voice :)
It mentions that this was a culture without written language. I wonder if that was important - once you develop writing, it might be easier to pass notes than invent this.
The Incas that followed them had recorded language. I doubt it is really known positively that Chimu had no recorded language. There are quite a few peoples groups in the western hemisphere for which it is commonly asserted by outsiders they had no recorded language, but once you start studying them at all, you find they have a recorded language.
So, the concept of a taught string bound to a resonating body, simple as it is may have been a precursor.
It is possible gourds where used as mounting points on some of the contraptions, and the ability of hollow spaces to resonate was probably already known... which leads to Capoeira-like instruments...
but the next leap of getting the thing to pick up voice is imo a larger conceptual leap. Of course, by then, written language was widespread and ideas could maintain a bit more momentum...
Yet still, notice how the bottom of the cup is of a different material and not tightly coupled to the rest of the cup. It's attached with a woven or knitted "sock." That's where energy leaves the system instead of bouncing energy back into the twine like bows. That's a great conceptual leap, considering it's not totally obvious to most people today how the bridge of stringed instrument works :)
I imagine they had built large string and hollow-body resonator combinations...
Yet it's yet another step to make it "input-"sensitive to human voice :)