HUMAN EVOLUTION SEREIS 5 : Homo floresiensis known as "Flores man" or "Hobbit"

 

My 3D animation of Homo floresiensis known as "Flores man" or "Hobbit"

Homo floresiensis The “Hobbits” of Flores Island

Unraveling the enigma of human evolution in Flores Island at Liang Bua cave near Ruteng. In the annals of human evolution, few discoveries have sparked as much intrigue and fascination as the unearthing of Homo floresiensis, affectionately dubbed the “hobbits” of Flores Island. Geographically, Liang Bua cave is located about 15 km north of Ruteng town, the capital of Manggarai Regency on Flores Island. Research discovered Liang Bua Cave on Flores in 2003, these ancient humans have reshaped our understanding of the human family tree and challenged conventional notions of what it means to be human.

 

Archeological excavations at Liang Bua.

Standing at just over three feet tall and possessing a brain the size of a grapefruit, Homo floresiensis presents a perplexing puzzle to scientists. Initially thought to be a modern human with a pathological condition such as microcephaly, further analysis of the skeletal remains revealed a distinct species with a unique set of anatomical features.

The LB1 skeleton is the most complete Homo floresiensis fossil found to date. The adult female was just 1.05m tall and perhaps 30 years old when she died.

 

Dating back approximately 50,000 to 100,000 years ago, Homo floresiensis coexisted with early modern humans and may have shared the landscape with other hominin species such as Homo erectus. Their diminutive stature and primitive stone tools suggest a life lived on the fringes of human evolution, yet their remarkable adaptability allowed them to thrive in the challenging environment of Pleistocene Flores.

 

One of the most compelling aspects of the Homo floresiensis discovery is its implications for our understanding of human migration and dispersal. The presence of these ancient humans on a remote island such as Flores raises questions about how they arrived there and the routes they may have taken. Some theories propose that they may have used primitive watercraft to navigate the seas, while others suggest they may have been stranded on the island and evolved in isolation.

 

The discovery of Homo floresiensis has also sparked debate among scientists about the nature of human evolution and the definition of a distinct species. Some argue that they may represent a unique branch of the human family tree, while others suggest they may be descended from an earlier hominin species such as Homo erectus.

Homo floresiensis evolved from a group of hominins who somehow crossed the sea to the Indonesian island of Flores perhaps more than a million years ago. Shrinking in size may have been a useful adaptation to island life

 

Today, the Liang Bua Cave serves as a pilgrimage site for paleoanthropologists and curious travelers alike, offering a window into the distant past and the remarkable journey of human evolution. As researchers continue to uncover new clues and insights into the enigmatic world of Homo floresiensis, one thing remains certain: these diminutive inhabitants of Flores Island continue to capture our imagination and challenge our understanding of what it means to be human.

Floresiensis skull

Homo floresiensis: the real-life 'hobbit'?

t just over one metre tall, the ancient human species Homo floresiensis might have been slight in stature, but it has attracted lengthy debate due to its mysterious origins.

H. floresiensis has been said to be a relative of Homo erectus, an offshoot of a far more ancient human ancestor or even a diseased population of modern humans. But it can't be all three, so which is most likely?

Discovered in a cave in Indonesia in 2003, Homo floresiensis seems to have lived not long before modern humans appeared in the region.

At the start of this millennium, most palaeoanthropologists believed that only modern humans - our species, Homo sapiens - had managed to travel beyond the Southeast Asian mainland towards New Guinea and Australia.

Although Homo erectus reached Java, which is now an island, it was periodically connected to the mainland. It seemed very unlikely that archaic humans had watercraft capable of crossing the ocean. The discovery of Homo floresiensis on a remote Indonesian island changed things dramatically.

Cast of the almost-complete LB1 Homo floresiensis fossil skull showing the species' fairly large brow ridges. This ancient human had a small cranial capacity, with a brain size estimated to be similar to that of a chimpanzee

Homo floresiensis facts

Lived: at least 100,000 to about 50,000 years ago

Where: the island of Flores, Indonesia

Appearance: short with a very small skull, definite brow ridge, short legs and large, flat feet

Brain size: about 420cm3

Height: about 1.05-1.10m

Weight: about 25kg

Diet: largely unknown, but probably included meat

Species named in: 2004

Name meaning: 'human from Flores' - sometimes referred to as Flores Man

Important Homo floresiensis fossils

Homo floresiensis was discovered in 2003 on an expedition led by the archaeologist Mike Morwood. In continuing excavations, the team uncovered more than 100 Homo floresiensis fossils at Liang Bua, including the partial skeleton of a female, labelled Liang Bua 1 or LB1, and fragmentary fossils of at least 13 more individuals

When did Homo floresiensis live?

Exactly when Homo floresiensis appeared on Flores is unclear, but the oldest known remains are at least 100,000 years old, while some stone tools attributed to Homo floresiensis are as much as 190,000 years old.

As mentioned, scientists found older fossils on the island - a 700,000-year-old jawbone and teeth - that may be from a related hominin population.

When Homo floresiensis was first discovered, the team dated the fossil skeleton to less than 20,000 years old. If the species was present on Flores that recently, it would mean that a primitive hominin had survived on the island well into the era of modern humans.

However, the age of the skeleton was later revised to about 60,000 years old, with an estimated last appearance of Homo floresiensis about 50,000 years ago, based on stone tools.

So far, no modern human remains have been found in the region as early as 50,000 years ago, so this revised date might mean Homo floresiensis was physically extinct before the appearance of modern humans in the region.

3D reconstruction of Homo floresiensis 

What did Homo floresiensis look like?

Homo floresiensis was very short compared to the average modern human, standing at about 1.05 metres tall. This is what earned Homo floresiensis its nickname 'the hobbit', after a fictional group of short, human-like creatures created by author J R R Tolkien.

 

When Homo floresiensis was first discovered, archaeologists thought it must be the skeleton of a modern human child. However, the tiny skull had defined brow ridges, which are not characteristic of modern humans, and the individual had fully developed wisdom teeth, indicating it was an adult not a child.

Along with a very small brain - around 420 centimetres cubed in volume, about a third of the size of our brains - Homo floresiensis had an unusual body shape. The hipbones were broad and flared, the collarbone was short and the shoulder joint was positioned quite far forwards. The species also had large, flat feet.

Individuals from Liang Bua also show foot, hand, wrist and jaw traits that look more primitive than those of any human dating to within the past million years.

These archaic characteristics bear similarities to some species of australopithecines. Australopiths represent a more ancient branch of hominins - the family tree to which modern humans, extinct human species and all our immediate ancestors belong. This might suggest Homo floresiensis evolved from a very ancient divergence in the hominin family tree.

Yet Homo floresiensis also shares characteristics in common with our more recent relative, Homo erectus, for example, aspects of the skull shape.

This puzzling combination of characteristics has fuelled an ongoing debate around Homo floresiensis' place in the story of human evolution.

How was Homo floresiensis different in appearance from Homo sapiens?

Along with its smaller stature and large, flat feet, Homo floresiensis had other physical traits that were different to those of modern humans. These included a tiny skull with a small braincase, protruding brow ridges and no prominent chin. In comparison, Homo sapiens have a high and rounded braincase, a small face tucked under the forehead, small and separated brow ridges and a chin on the lower jaw.

 

Homo floresiensis' wide hips and shoulders also differ from our species' relatively narrow body.

 

3D reconstruction of  Homo floresiensis in front of their cave

Why was Homo floresiensis so small?

There are several theories as to why Homo floresiensis was so small.

 

The team who discovered Homo floresiensis originally proposed that a population of the species Homo erectus travelled to Flores from Java, perhaps by boat, and once on Flores they shrunk in size over hundreds of thousands of years. This is an example of insular dwarfism, also called island dwarfism, a process where large animals isolated on islands evolve smaller bodies because they have limited resources and no large predators to defend themselves against.

However, the australopithecine-like physical characteristics of Homo floresiensis suggest it evolved from a far more ancient and smaller ancestor than Homo erectus. Some other scientists suggested that Homo floresiensis is not a distinct species but rather a population of Homo sapiens with a condition such as microcephaly, where the brain develops to a smaller size. However, there are no known diseases or conditions in Homo sapiens that match what we find in Homo floresiensis and finds on the island from about 700,000 years ago already show some of its traits.

3D reconstruction of  Homo floresiensis in front of their cave

So is Homo floresiensis a separate human species?

Yes - while we don't have all the answers as to how it developed its unique set of traits, Homo floresiensis is a distinct human species.

The lively, ongoing debate is why the discovery of Homo floresiensis is an important chapter in the ever-unfolding story of the human journey. It demonstrates how an unexpected find like Homo floresiensis can contribute to our understanding of human evolution and cause us to question our previous assumptions.

Interestingly, another small-bodied human species, Homo luzonensis, was recently found nearly 3,000 miles away in the Philippines. This species has been dated to at least 50,000-67,000 years old, making it around the same age as Homo floresiensis. However, while they share some characteristics in common, Homo floresiensis and Homo luzonensis bear varying combinations of characteristics, which identify them as two separate human species.

Discoveries such as Homo floresiensis and Homo luzonensis provide a particularly valuable contribution to our understanding of ancient human diversity in Asia and Southeast Asia, which is currently poorly represented in the fossil record.