The spacing of the four holes on a fragment of a bone fl ute excavated at a Neanderthal campsite is just what is
required to play the third through sixth notes of the diatonic scale—the seven-note musical scale used in much
of Western music since the Renaissance. Musicologists therefore hypothesize that the diatonic musical scale
was developed and used thousands of years before it was adopted by Western musicians.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the hypothesis?
(A) Bone fl utes were probably the only musical instrument made by Neanderthals.
(B) No musical instrument that is known to have used a diatonic scale is of an earlier date than the fl ute found at the Neanderthal campsite.
(C) The fl ute was made from a cave-bear bone and the campsite at which the fl ute fragment was excavated was in a cave that also contained skeletal remains of cave bears.
(D) Flutes are the simplest wind instrument that can be constructed to allow playing a diatonic scale.
(E) The cave-bear leg bone used to make the Neanderthal fl ute would have been long enough to make a fl ute
capable of playing a complete diatonic scale.
