Peru
Nazca Culture 

Bamboo reed, textile
ca. 100 BCE to 800 CE
Height: 18.5 in; Width: 4.8 in
Aerophones – Wind Instruments Proper – Edge-blown Flutes

Pre-Columbian panpipes from the Nazca culture, an archaeological culture that flourished from ca. 100 BCE to 800 CE. The Nazca culture is located beside the arid, southern coast of Peru in the river valleys of the Rio Grande de Nazca drainage and the Ica Valley. 

This beautiful set of reed panpipes, held together with woven string, features seven pipes of varying size. Panpipes were a crucial part of Nazca ritual, played alongside clay trumpets, drums, and rattles. For example, there are vessels with drawings of musicians/shamans playing this style of instrument, surrounded by cacti (representing hallucinogenic drugs made from the San Pedro cactus), obviously in a ritual procession.  Indeed, it seems that panpipes were crucial for a shaman to act as an intermediary between the worlds of the spirit and the everyday life.