How long has the piccolo been around?

Answer 1

This is a difficult question because its full name "flauto piccolo" simply means small Flute and we have actual evidence there have been small flutes in existence since Neanderthal times. If we just mean a small flute, then the piccolo (or at least the fragment that was found in Divje babe, Slovenia) is the oldest existing musical instrument on the planet! (It's at least 45,000 years old.)

There is evidence that little flutes were played in mediaeval times, but although they were the ancestors of our modern piccolo, they were not called piccolos. The term "piccolo" by itself, meaning little flute doesn't really appear until well into the 1800s.

Small cross-blown flutes with one key (before there were the modern instruments designed by Boehm) were occasionally used in French Opera orchestras at least as early as 1735. There is a lot of confusion however about the early piccolo because "flute" could mean either a cross-blown flute or a recorder-type of flute and the French, in particular, would label the parts "Petites flutes" so that it is exceedingly difficult to know exactly which type of instrument was intended.

It is far too often that Beethoven is credited with being the first to include the piccolo in a symphony (Beethoven's Fifth 1807-8), because there were several composers including Michael Haydn, Hoffmeister and Sussmayr who did so well before the year 1800!

.