Tiny ‘hobbit’ human fossils dating back 700,000 years found in Indonesia

globalnews.ca:

hobbit” humans on the Indonesian island of Flores, a new team has found fossils that are even smaller and even more ancient.The original hobbit fossils — named after the fictional race in The Lord of the Rings — date back to between 60,000 and 100,000 years ago. The species was dubbed Homo floresiensis, referring to the island of Flores where they were found, and scientists estimate they stood about 3.5 feet tall.

The only hobbit fossils ever found have been discovered in Flores.The new fossils were found at a site called Mata Menge, about 72 kilometres from the Liang Bua cave where the first hobbit bones were uncovered. These remains date back a staggering 700,000 years.An international team of scientists helped analyze the bones and the results of their research were published Tuesday in Nature Communications.

The study found that the bones represent the ancestors of Homo floresiensis, who were even shorter in stature.From a partial jawbone, six teeth and a carefully reconstructed arm bone, researchers were able to estimate that the hobbit ancestors were about 2.4 inches shorter than their descendants. The disparity in size could come down to natural variation within the species, as is seen in modern humans, but what the results do clearly show is that Homo floresiensis has maintained its small size over a remarkably long period of time.This is important because scientists still don’t know why or how this race of humans came to be so tiny.One theory suggests that the hobbits shrank from an earlier, taller human species called Homo erectus, which is believed to be the first early human species to migrate out of Africa.The fossils of Homo erectus have been found in Asia as far east as China and the Indonesian island of