The traits and beliefs of each generation live and evolve in the one that follows. So in our own families and cultures we see something of our ancestors. This applies to our immediate ancestors, those from the shadows of the beginnings of human life and everyone in between. Because of their influence on the earliest civilizations, this also applies to a species very much like us, but one that became extinct, the Neanderthals.

We sometimes hear echoes of their ancient traditions, believe it or not, in popular music. Here's one way:

From what we can understand, for the earliest people, probably including Neanderthals, an important part of their belief system was the idea that the dead communicated with the living. It was thought that they continued to live in a different form and continued to involve themselves in everyday life. It was also believed that they interceded with other spirits and gods on behalf of their living relatives. This concept is reflected, to varying degrees, in Buddhism and Taoism, as well as other contemporary religions.

It was also believed that the living communicated with ancestors and the divine through music. As it is a non-verbal form of expression, it makes sense that music would be perceived as the language of non-physical entities. The fact that music is 'inspired' may also play a part. We find this in the earliest civilization we know of, Sumer.

Archaeologists have found what may be the oldest existing instrument, a 50,000 year old flute of human bone. Why human bone? Perhaps because ancestors and music were what linked people, spirits and gods. If one believed this to be the case, what clearer way to communicate with the divine than the bones of an ancestor? What better way to communicate with the ancestor, for that matter.

This is repugnant to us, but we can't make a fair value judgment over 50,000 years. It's far less repugnant to me than, say, the ancient but more recent Native South American practice of playing basketball with human heads.

Of course, use of human bone in religious ceremony has not survived in the above-mentioned living religions that revere ancestors. It was not necessarily even part of the ancient traditions of these people, though similar artifacts have appeared from time to time. Ancient Hindu Tantric artifacts include ceremonial aprons carved from human bone, for example.

But enough of all that. In what song do we still hear echoes of these traditions, of the Neanderthal flute? We hear them in the traditional European ballad, "Two Sisters" and it's nearly countless variants. The song is found under different titles all over the world.

The song is not limited to the tradition of any one culture. This indicates that it is rooted in a culture more ancient than any surviving one.

The song has remained popular. It has been recorded in our lifetime. The two most notable versions are by Mike Seeger and The Grateful Dead, both titled, "The Wind and The Rain".

The particulars vary with each version but the core story of each is that a woman is murdered. Her body is found by a musician, who makes an instrument of it. The instrument then speaks on the dead girls behalf. It points to her murderer who is then brought to justice.

A similar story is told in the Grimm's fairy tale, "The Singing Bone", where a murdered princess tells the court of her murder via a harp made from her bones. We also see the concept, sans instrument, in Shakespeare's "Hamlet", where his father's murderer is revealed before the court by travelling minstrels.

Travelling poets, (think Homer), and later travelling minstrels, kept religious stories and ideas alive. They were also entertainers and reporters, (think the town crier). So the story of the murdered girl we find in "Two Sisters", etc. most likely has roots in an actual event, (or events). The story of the singing bone, is probably a separate, religious story.

It could be that the two have always been the same, that ancient people believed the bones of a murdered person told on the murderer. Or that more ancient people believed the bones of a murdered person spoke more clearly to the gods. It's impossible to say 50,000 years later.

It is not at all impossible, however, to imagine that the Neanderthal flute found by archaeologists relates directly to the fiddle that speaks for the dead in the Grateful Dead song. So, listen to "The Wind and The Rain" and you, in a sense, hear one of the first songs ever.