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| Sunday, 7 November 2004 |
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Junior Observer |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Did 'Hobbits' really exist? A new tiny human species has been discovered in Indonesia
Remember little Hobbit 'Frodo Baggins', the ring bearer of the popular Lord of the Rings series? Although we enjoyed and loved all the Hobbits that came in the Lord of the Rings (especially Frodo) - we all believed they were mythical characters, didn't we ? But according to a latest investigation by a group of scientists, a tiny species of human similar to a 'Hobbit' has actually lived in Indonesia. Discovery The discovery of this tiny human by Australian and Indonesian scientists has been hailed as one of the most significant of its kind in the decade. Details of the investigation are described in the journal Nature. According to scientists the three-foot (one-metre) tall species lived on Flores island at least 12,000 years ago.
Australian archaeologists unearthed the bones while digging at a site called Liang Bua, one of the numerous limestone caves on Flores. The remains of the partial skeleton were found at a depth of 5.9m and initially the researchers thought it was the body of a child. But further investigations revealed otherwise, because the wear on the teeth and growth lines on the skull confirm it was an adult. Features of the skeleton identify it as female and a long bone confirms that it walked upright like we do. The 18,000 specimen, known as Liang Bua 1 or LB1, has been assigned to a new species called Homo floresiensis. It was about one metre tall with long arms and a skull the size of a large grapefruit. Species The researchers have since found remains belonging to six other individuals from the same species. The Liang Bua 1 was not alone. LB1 shared its island with a golden retriever-sized rat, giant tortoises and huge lizards including komodo dragons and a pony sized dwarf elephant called 'Stegodon'.
H. Floresiensis probably evolved from another species called Homo erectus, whose remains have been discovered on the Indonesian island of Java. Homo erectus may have arrived on Flores about one million years ago, evolving a tiny physique in the isolation provided by the island. What is more interesting is that according to the senior editor of the Nature magazine Dr. Henry Gee, species like H.floresiensis might still exist, somewhere in the unexplored tropical forests of Indonesia. The sophistication of stone tools found with the 'Hobbit' has surprised some scientists given the human's small brain size, which is similar to that of the chimpanzee. |
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