My mother brought this over tonight. I have no idea what it is.
I believe it is some sort of ancient religious artifact because when she manipulated it, it gave off an unworldly noise, like a shaman incantation or someone speaking in tongues.
There was an inscription on the reverse of it, identifying its origin.
Unfortunately, the civilization that made it has long since died off and little remains of their texts.
I have included pictures (below):
I know what it is! In ancient times, circa 1968 AD, this artifact was used by primitive tribes known collectively as “music buffs.” Not much is known about them, because surviving music from their rituals is widely divergent, and seems to have no common theme. One surviving artifact, which has been discovered to be the music of a revered shaman named “Jimi Hendrix,” has no relation to another partial fragment discovered in another ancient ruin, called “The Carpenters.” More research needs to be done. Send funding!
Complete musical performances are rare. The media the “music” was stored on was was very primitive and was often sacrificed to the gods when containers of such “music” were fed to the artifact shown and it would randomly eat the storage media.
Isn’t it an “answering machine” ??????
Looks like a device that would answer the phone when you were out or otherwise engaged. A primitive voicemail device.
I see it is from a “Radio Shack” whoever they were. Maybe it’s some sort of radio device. I think they were an early means of communication.