The most ancient instrument is probably the tsuur, which is shown in cave wall paintings dated to the 4th or 3rd millennium BC.
In contrast most of the Mongolic ethnicities adopted four instruments for folk music and other oral performances: the Tovshuur, huuchir, morin khuur and the tsuur.
In modern times some instruments have been adapted like the 21-stringed yatga (about 10 strings added), the morin khuur (modification of the sound box and string material) - or invented in the 1960s for completing orchestras like the "ih huur", a horse headed double bass, also having a trapezoid sound box.
Most of these instruments had been modified during the 1940s and 1960, for standardization during the communist period in Mongolia and the time after the cultural revolution in China.
Only accompanied with the morin huur, mostly performed in yurts with imitating daily tasks of the nomads life.