Indonesia’s ‘hobbits’ disappeared earlier: study

‘Spectacular discovery’

PARIS, March 31, (Agencies): A group of extinct human relatives dubbed “hobbits”, which left tantalising traces of their existence in an Indonesian cave, disappeared much longer ago than previously thought, archaeologists said on Wednesday.

Homo floresiensis, a primitive, diminutive hominin, inhabited the Liang Bua cave on Flores island from about 190,000 to 50,000 years ago, reported the team, which spent years accurately redating sections of the archaeological site.

The pint-sized creatures were previously said to have lived in the cave until as recently as 12,000 years ago.

This would have meant they survived until long after modern humans reached Southeast Asia some 50,000 years ago, and may even have lived side-by-side with our ancestors.

The redating of the dig site, which has yielded fossils of hobbits and their stone tools, did not make it any clearer whether H. floresiensis were likely to have crossed paths with Homo sapiens.

“Whether H. floresiensis survived after (50,000 years) ago — potentially encountering modern humans on Flores... — is an open question,” the team wrote in the journal Nature.

The hobbits of Liang Bua have been the cause of much scientific controversy since their remains were first discovered in 2003.

Were they a human ancestor? A different species altogether? Or humans suffering from dwarfism or microcephaly, the brain-shrinking disease afflicting babies in Latin America and the Caribbean today?

Different studies have yielded different answers.

An adult hobbit stood about a metre (three feet) tall and weighed about 25 kgs (55 pounds).

Dubbed hobbits by scientists, after the short, hairy-footed creatures in J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, they had small brains, about the size of a chimpanzee’s, and relatively large feet for their stature.

H. floresiensis shared Flores island with pygmy elephants and giant rats, storks and lizards — species which went extinct at about the same time as all traces of hobbits are now known to have disappeared from the cave ... and coinciding with the arrival of modern humans.

There is no scientific evidence they ever met, but Flores locals tell stories of an ancient people called “ebu gogo” which lived in caves, were short, stocky and not all that bright, stole food and could not cook.

Some have suggested these legends may be fact rather than fiction — retold memories of encounters with H. floresiensis passed down from generation to generation.

Re-examined

For the new study, an international team of researchers re-examined the fossil-containing layers at the dig site, and found that some areas had been incorrectly dated.

“We dated charcoal, sediments, flowstones, volcanic ash and even the H. floresiensis bones themselves using the most up-to-date scientific methods available,” said study co-author Richard Roberts of the University of Wollongong in Australia.

It was a spectacular discovery: Fossil remains in an Indonesian cave revealed a recent relative of modern humans that stood about 3 feet tall. The creatures were quickly nicknamed “hobbits.”

With evidence that they had survived to just 12,000 years ago, the hobbits appeared to have been the last of our companions on the human branch of the evolutionary tree to go extinct.

Now, a decade after they made headlines, they’ve lost that distinction. New investigations indicate they evidently disappeared much earlier — about 50,000 years ago, before Neanderthals did, for example.

Speculation

The new date raises speculation about whether hobbits were doomed by the arrival of modern humans on their island. But it doesn’t change much about their scientific significance, said Matt Tocheri of Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Ontario.

He and others wrote the new paper with three of the researchers who’d first reported the discovery in 2004. The new paper was released Wednesday by the journal Nature.

The hobbits are formally known as Homo floresiensis, reflecting their home on the Indonesian island of Flores. With small, chimp-sized brains, the hobbits had skulls that resembled Homo erectus, which lived in Africa and Asia. But they also had long arms and short legs that harkened back to the much older evolutionary forerunners best known for the skeleton dubbed Lucy.

It’s not clear where they fit in the human family tree. They may have descended from taller ancestors who shrank because of their isolation on the island. Some scientists have argued they were diseased modern humans rather than a separate species, but experts called that a minority view and several said the new dates make it less likely.

Hobbits evidently made the stone tools that were found along with skeletal remains in the Liang Bua cave. The new analysis says the remains are 100,000 to 60,000 years old, while the artifacts range in age from about 190,000 to 50,000 years.

Researchers revised the original age estimates after new excavations revealed more about the geology of the cave. Sediments were sampled to date the artifacts and bones.

“I think it’s a terrific paper,” said Bernard Wood of George Washington University, who had no role in the research. “They have done everything you can possibly ask.”

So did the arrival of modern humans spell the end for the hobbits, as is proposed for the demise of the Neanderthals in Europe and Asia about 40,000 years ago?

There’s no evidence that modern humans occupied Flores until long after the hobbits were gone. But they are known to have lived not far away, in Australia, some 50,000 years ago — right about the time the hobbits evidently disappeared.

“It is certainly suggestive,” said anthropologist Karen Baab of Midwestern University in Glendale, Arizona, who studies the hobbits but didn’t participate in the new work.

Richard Roberts of the University of Wollongong in Australia, a study author, said in an email it is “certainly a possibility to be considered, but solid evidence is needed in order to demonstrate it. One thing we can be certain of, it will definitely be a major focus of further research.”