At https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/40000-year-old-rop… … a German team (see Archaologische Ausgrabungen Baden Wurttemberg) have found a rope or twine making tool dating to the Aurignacian period (roughly 40,000 years ago). Rope and twine are essential components in the toolbox of mobile hunting groups. Impressions of string have been found in fossil clay and are depicted on Ice Age art but on the whole rope, twine and string are biodegradable and absent from archaeological sites. The find is made from mammoth bone …
…. with four holes. Similar finds, no so well preserved, have turned up in the past but what they were used for has always been a mystery. Archaeologists have suggested they might be musical instruments of some kind, art work, or shaft straighteners. The item has been tested and works perfectly.