In a cottage roofed with reeds and fir branches and with a shady porch in front, a young girl lived who was unmatched in beauty. In her times singing was just joyful shouting with no rules. The girl would listen to the birds singing around her cottage in early mornings, and she tried to imitate them. She would answer the birds with her singing and she realized that her words merged into a song. She was behold by a youth who wished he could imitate her. His hand touched the taut string of his bow and it gave off a pleasing sound. He realized that he had just discovered something new. He fetched sticks, tied together two long ones and two short ones and tightened the strings between them. He found out that it was possible to obtain different tones from the instrument. Then a god appeared, tuned the strings on the lyre and sweetly play the youth’s tunes. One beautiful morning the girl was sitting in the wood and singing. She became aware that her song was accompanied by sounds she had never heard before. The youth emerged from the bushes, a flower wreath on his head and a lyre in his hand. Smiling, he shook hands with the shy girl and told her that it was he who had accompanied her. He suggested he would continue to accompany her singing. So they began to train boys and girls how to sing and pluck strings. The story concludes with a remark that flute accompaniment was of a later date. Marsyas took the flute to forest gods after its inventor, Athena/Minerva had angrily thrown it away into the sand.