I believe Huber was first to observe this.
Nnuvellcs Observations sur les Abeilles
“After the old queen has conducted the first
swarm from the hive, the remaining bees take
particular care of the royal ceils, and prevent the
young queens, as they are hatched in succession,
from leaving them, unless at intervals of several
days between each.” -Huber
Not sure when the association of piping and
confinement of queens came about, but Cowan
states:
'The “Tu-tu-tu” of the newly hatched young queen
is answered by the “Qua-qua-qua” of the queen
still imprisoned in their cells.'
American agriculturist, Volume 48
1889
http://books.google.com/books?id=jwIwAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA649#v=onepage&q&f=false
Page 649
Too Many Queens.— Jasper Blines, Clark Co., Mo.:
Where unrestricted swarming is allowed,
it is not an uncommon thing for
third swarms to issue, with two or
more young queens. When there are
several queen-cells in the hive, in
which the queens mature at the same
time, the first one hatched naturally
leads the issuing swarm. If at this
time there occur several rainy days to
prevent the issuing. the bees will hold
the caps upon the cells and prevent the
young queen from escaping. In such
cases, if the bee-keeper listen at the
hive, the young queens may be heard
piping. When the weather comes fair,
and the swarm issues, several queens
will be liberated and issue with the
swarm. Such swarms frequently
cluster in several bunches with the
different queens. In the case referred
to, they had evidently clustered together
and stung the superfluous queens.
Best Wishes,
Joe Waggle
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/HistoricalHoneybeeArticles/
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