Apparently, bagpipes have been around for 76 million years! Parasaurolophus, meaning “Near Crested Lizard”, is a genus of ornithopod dinosaur that lived in North America (Alberta, New Mexico, and Utah) during the late Cretaceous Period, about 76.5-73 million years ago. It was a herbivore that walked both as a biped and as a quadruped. This genus sported an elaborate cranial crest – its elongated nasal passages formed a long curved tube projecting upwards and back from the skull. Very bagpipey!
Parasaurolophus is often hypothesized to have used its crest as a resonating chamber to produce low frequency sounds to alert other members of a group or its species. The crest’s internal structures are similar to those of a swan and it is theorized that an animal could use its elongated nasal passages to create noise.
Weishampel in 1981 suggested that Parasaurolophus made noises ranging between the frequencies 55 and 720 Hz, although there was some difference in the range of individual species because of the crest size, shape, and nasal passage length. Note: Most musical instruments are tuned at standard concert pitch (440 Hz), while Great Highland Bagpipes are tuned around 470-480 Hz.
As a large object, the crest has clear value as a visual signal and sets this animal apart from its contemporaries. The large size of Parasaurolophus eye sockets and the presence of sclerotic rings in the eyes imply acute vision and diurnal habits, evidence that sight was important to these animals. If, as is commonly illustrated, a skin frill extended from the crest to the neck or back, the proposed visual display would have been even showier. As is suggested by other lambeosaurine skulls, the crest of Parasaurolophus likely permitted both species identification (such as separating it from Corythosaurus or Lambeosaurus) and sexual identification by shape and size.