TEHRAN -- A replica of the world’s first stringed instrument was unveiled during a ceremony in Qazvin on Saturday.

The harp will be played during the Five-Thousand Years Creation Song performance at Persepolis in 2009.
Dating back to 4000 B.C., the instrument is half size of the Iranian harp from which other world stringed instruments originate.
According to seals and other documents excavated by archeologists Pinhas Pierre Delougaz (1901-1975), and Helene Kantor (1919-1993), the instrument is the oldest stringed instrument in the world, archeological expert Seifollah Shokri told ISNA.
Calling the instrument part of Iranian identity, Shokri said that according to the findings of Delougaz and Kantor, the world’s first concert was also held in Iran.
The replica is made of walnut, the same wood as the original. The harp contains a resonator mechanism on which 21 intervals can be reproduced, giving it the capacity to be used for all world melodies, Shokri added.
The instrument was made after an eight-year investigation by a five-member group of Iranian experts, he mentioned.
It will be presented as the first cultural present of the Dialogue Among Civilizations Project to the United Nations Secretary-General after the performance in 2009, he said.
The entire investigation surrounding the instrument and its history in several cultures will be compiled in a book that will be published by the United Nations, he concluded.