'Human hobbit' of the lost world discovered
A 3ft tall "hobbit" uncovered on the Indonesian island of Flores has raised the extraordinary possibility that our human species might not be alone on Earth.
The female creature has been identified as a completely new member of the human race. But, although she lived 18,000 years ago, scientists believe her relatives survived for thousands more years on the island.
And experts have not ruled out the possibility of her descendants, or other unknown human species, still hiding in the impenetrable forests and cave systems of south-east Asia.
Mythical tales abound in the region of a race of little people that dwell on the islands of Indonesia. Dutch explorers who colonised Flores 100 years ago were told stories of a human-like creature local inhabitants called "ebu gogo."
Like the hominid whose skeletal remains have excited scientists around the world, they stood about 3ft tall. The tales described how they could be heard "murmuring" to one another, and how, parrot-fashion, they repeated back words spoken to them. Dr Henry Gee, senior editor of scientific journal Nature, said the scientists who made the new discovery of the seven remains were now having to think again about the source of these stories. "Until they found this creature they would have dismissed them as tales of hobbits and leprechauns, but no longer," he said.
The new human, named Homo floresiensis, is a dwarf-sized descendent of another primitive species that left Africa about two million years ago. A grapefruit-sized skull and partial skeleton of a female specimen was unearthed at a cave site called Liang Bua.
The Australian team, led by Dr Peter Brown from the University of New England in Armidale, Australia, has now found several other specimens at the same site.
Whether or not there is any truth in the legends, the creature would have lived at the same time as our own branch of the human family, Homo sapiens.
It used to be thought that human evolution followed a linear path as one species gave way to another.
But modern humans and Neanderthals are now known to have co-existed in Europe 30,000 years ago. Homo Floresiensis is only the second example of a different human species from our own living alongside our ancestors - but much more recent. The find, details of which were published in the Nature, has been hailed as one of the most important human origin discoveries of the last 100 years.
Professor Chris Stringer, head of human origins at the Natural History Museum in London, said: "This has really re-written the textbooks.
"To have this creature present less than 20,000 years ago is astonishing.
"In terms of the bigger questions of human evolution as a whole, and how complex it was and how much we still have to learn, I cannot underestimate its importance. At first, some of my colleagues were in a state of complete disbelief that such a thing could have existed."
Together with the bones, the researchers uncovered a number of delicate stone tools thought to have been used by Homo Floresiensis.
The creatures were not the only unusual inhabitants of the island. Being cut-off from the mainland, evolution ran its own course on Flores, giving rise to a "lost world" that could have come straight out of the pages of Gulliver's Travels.
Besides "hobbits", elephants the size of ponies and rats as big as dogs roamed the island and were probably hunted by Homo Floresiensis. They themselves may have been hunted by terrifying giant lizards.
Most of the prehistoric fauna on Flores was thought to have been wiped out by a volcanic eruption 12,000 years ago. But the folklore of Flores raises the intriguing possibility that its race of dwarfs may have lived on. Dr Gee said: "Who knows, in remote patches of rain forests one may find relic populations. It's even more likely we might find some nearly extinct forms in some of these unexplored caves. It is possible that there are creatures like this around. I don't think the likelihood of finding a new species of human alive today is any less than that of finding a new antelope."
Prof Stringer said the discovery raised a plethora of questions, such as where the creatures came from, whether or not they spoke a language, and how they might have been regarded by modern humans.
It is thought that they evolved from Homo erectus, who must have crossed the sea to reach the island. But this is a mystery in itself because, although H. erectus was known to have made fire and used tools, there has never been any record of boat-building.
Another riddle is the tiny brain size of Homo Floresiensis, which at 380 millilitres is smaller than a chimpanzee's. Scientists had thought there was a brain size threshold for human intelligence which was much larger. Yet the new species clearly retained its intelligence despite shrinking to such a small size.
Scientists are now looking to see if DNA samples can be extracted from the remains, which should shed new light on the creatures.
The Australian team expects more dramatic human finds to be uncovered on other islands in south-east Asia.
The discovery: a human dwarf species on the remote Indonesian island of Flores.
The implications: smashes theory modern humans began to crowd out other upright-walking species 160,000 years ago.
What we know: they had grapefruit-sized brains but made stone tools.
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