While major kazoo research has been minimal for the past few decades, those of us willing to explore the record will find the kazoo to have a fascinating history. Though some revisionist Biblical scholars mistakenly insist that kazoos, not trumpets, brought down the walls of Jericho, more substantial rumor places the origins of this instrument with the Roman military kazoo bands that led Caesar's legions against the Celtic hordes of Vercingetorix in 52 BC. 
The record fades, of course, with the fall of Rome; however, through the oral tradition, we can follow the further development of the kazoo within the kingdoms of Charlemagne and Pippin the Short, along the Mediterranean Crusade routes, throughout the decaying empire of Byzantium, and even across the English Channel with the more lyrical vassals of William the Conqueror. In fact, the kazoo, called the chasoux royale all through the Dark Ages, was essentially a French device well into the 14th Century and was played at banquet or in boudoir by nobles and commoners alike.
In the 1340s, the name kazoo was first used to describe this instrument. The little-known story of how this took place is found in the scholarly works of one Ethelred, an Italian cleric and raconteur well known in his day for his charm and wit, and remembered by historians as Fool of Bolongna. As Ethelred recounts the event, the Dauphine, the future Jean II, surnamed the Inept, was entertaining at court and was wooing the lovely and ever-amenable Isabelle by playing chansons d'amore (love songs) on his gold-inlaid chasoux royale (kazoo). 
Ethelred continues:
The Dauphine, full unto bursting with mirthe and merriment, did plai both longe and loude and with divers qualitie and with great force did he bloe. And the faire Isabelle near swooned for he did plai but a handsbreadth from her ear. And when he did hit the eighth note of the Lydian mode and hit he did at most prodigious volume, and thinking he to kiss her cheeke at completion thereof, and leaning he close unto her, the Dauphine did sneeze, he having inhaled fur of the cat on Isabelle's shoulder; and a most wonderous and exalted and abundant sneeze did he bloe, for he was of noble birth. And the cat did strike the wall, the houndes did barke, the hawkes they did flutter, and all who could hear were most amazed. The faire Isabelle did faint dead away across table and roasted pig, upon cleric and noble and servant alike did she sprawl. And when her spirite did return and awakened was she, spake she with voice aquiver and eardrums split asunder so that she did shout, "Goode m' Lorde, I do but live by thy grace and by thine every word and thy words do fill me with joie and wonder and awe. Praye thee then, Sire, was that last word not KAZOO?"

And of course, it was!
From this point in time, we are all well aware of the meteoric rise of the kazoo in both liturgical and classical music. Who can forget Pastorelli's Kazoo Requiem for Pope Alexander? Or Primante's Der Flederkazoo? Or Paderoushky's Symphony #3 in C#: Kazooica? Or my personal favorite, Marde Gras to Oktoberfest: A Kazoo Pastorale by Yanni. However, few are aware of the origins of the kazoo's influence on the 20th century Folk Rock Movement. Long before Dylan, Baez, or Elvis, there was the legendary Richard "Blind Lemming" Kowalsky making history at the Chicago Music and Bratwurst Festival of 1948. It was "only" a 20- minute session with the von Trapp Family Singers but when the applause had died down and the beer bottles ceased hitting the chicken wire, no one could doubt that a trend had been set. Indeed, it was a trend that would lead not only to the rash of all-electric kazoo bands of the '60s and '70s but also to the development of the non-digital, non-analog, voice-synthesized kazoos still in wide use today.