Friedrich Seeberger

Friedrich Seeberger (* 1938 ; † November 15, 2007 ) was a German precision engineering engineer from Ulm who, in collaboration with the Prehistoric Museum Blaubeuren, recreated 35,000-year-old bone and ivory flutes for analysis purposes. In general, Seeberger was interested in how life worked in the Stone Age . Through this interest he developed into a highly respected experimental archaeologist .

life and work

In addition to his job as an engineer, Seeberger was fascinated by the cultural history of our Stone Age ancestors. He supplemented theoretical attempts to explain Stone Age culture with methods of experimental archeology. He modeled the manufacture and use of many Stone Age devices. By means of reconstructed Stone Age devices, Seeberger was able to show what was possible for Stone Age people and what was probably denied them. Seeberger passed this valuable knowledge on to interested laypeople in museum courses in Blaubeuren, Bad Buchau, Unteruhldingen and Stuttgart. In such courses he literally made Stone Age devices "understandable". He also documented this acquired knowledge about Stone Age culture in specialist publications.

In his active engineering life, Friedrich Seeberger worked as a developer and head of quality assurance for a materials testing company. Since 1976 he has been occupied with technical questions in the field of paleolithic archeology in his free time . In the course of time he developed from a scientific layman to a specialist in the field of experimental archeology, whose advice was highly valued.

The best known are undoubtedly Seeberger's works in the field of musical archeology . Using palaeolithic technologies, Seeberger created replicas of palaeolithic instruments such as drums, scrapers , rattles , buzzers and musical bows . He also demonstrated how to play such musical instruments. He was particularly concerned with replicas of the bird bone and mammoth ivory flutes from the Aurignacien des Geißenklösterle , a cave on the Swabian Alb. The flutes found there from 40,000 to 35,000 years before our era are classified as the oldest archaeologically proven musical instruments in the world. In numerous concerts - including in caves - Seeberger demonstrated the playability of these instruments on his replicas. A permanent testimony to this work is a CD recorded together with the Prehistoric Museum Blaubeuren .

In addition, Seeberger worked on topics such as Stone Age hunting techniques and hunting weapons (arrow, bow, spear thrower) as well as handicraft tools such as stone axes and flint knives. He also researched the manufacture of Stone Age objects from organic materials such as wooden and birch bark vessels, wooden combs and leather containers. An important area in Seeberger's experimental Stone Age technologies was the subject of fire. He experimentally contrasted the various Stone Age possibilities for igniting a fire.

Seeberger advised and supported the Tübingen archaeological research team in their preparations for the 2005 excavations in the Vogelherd cave . "He donated parts of his archaeological finds to the collection of the Department of Ancient Prehistory and Quaternary Ecology at the University of Tübingen."

literature

Georg Hiller: Obituary for Friedrich Seeberger (1938–2007). In: Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Urgeschichte 16, 2007, pp. 109–114 ( digitized version ).

Web links

Literature by and about Friedrich Seeberger in the bibliographic database WorldCat
Philip Wolff: How did the music of the Stone Age sound? Süddeutsche Zeitung, May 17, 2010, accessed on February 15, 2020 (there is an interview with Friedrich Seeberger on paleolithic flutes).
Rüdiger Bischoff: Stone Age Sounds. Deutschlandradio Kultur, April 23, 2014, accessed on February 15, 2020 (There is also an interview with Friedrich Seeberger on the paleolithic flutes of the Swabian Alb.).
Wind tunnel (forum for the recorder): The oldest flutes in the world. Retrieved February 15, 2020 (With reconstructed Paleolithic flutes and audio files of such played flutes by Friedrich Seeberger).

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r ^s ^t ^u ^v ^w ^x ^y ^z Georg Hiller: Obituary for Friedrich Seeberger (1938–2007). In: Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Urgeschichte 16, 2007, pp. 109–114.
↑ ^a ^b ^c Philip Wolff: How did the music of the Stone Age sound?
↑ See Susanne Münzel, Friedrich Seeberger, Wulf Hein: The Geissenkloesterle Flute - Discovery, Experiments, Reconstruction. In: Ellen Hickmann , Anne D. Kilmer, Ricardo Eichmann (eds.): Studies in Music Archeology III. Archeology of early sound generation and tone order. Verlag Marie Leidorf, Rahden 2002, pp. 107–118.

personal data
SURNAME	Seeberger, Friedrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German experimental archaeologist and precision engineering engineer
DATE OF BIRTH	1938
DATE OF DEATH	November 15, 2007

[:0-1] ↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r ^s ^t ^u ^v ^w ^x ^y ^z Georg Hiller: Obituary for Friedrich Seeberger (1938–2007). In: Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Urgeschichte 16, 2007, pp. 109–114.

[:1-2] Philip Wolff: How did the music of the Stone Age sound?

[3] See Susanne Münzel, Friedrich Seeberger, Wulf Hein: The Geissenkloesterle Flute - Discovery, Experiments, Reconstruction. In: Ellen Hickmann , Anne D. Kilmer, Ricardo Eichmann (eds.): Studies in Music Archeology III. Archeology of early sound generation and tone order. Verlag Marie Leidorf, Rahden 2002, pp. 107–118.