A recent study has revealed that the ancestors of the famous “hobbits,” a species of early humans discovered on an Indonesian island twenty years ago, were even shorter than previously thought.
Scientists originally unearthed fossils of the hobbits, who stood at about 3.5 feet tall, on an Indonesian island. The newly found fossils, excavated at a site called Mata Menge, indicate that their ancestors were 2.4 inches shorter and existed 700,000 years ago.
Research co-author Yousuke Kaifu of the University of Tokyo expressed surprise at the discovery, stating, “We did not expect that we would find smaller individuals from such an old site.”
These early humans, nicknamed “hobbits” after characters in “The Lord of the Rings,” are believed to have lived between 60,000 and 100,000 years ago. The findings, published in the journal Nature Communications, shed light on the evolution and extinction of this unique human species.
Dean Falk, an evolutionary anthropologist at Florida State University, praised the study, stating, “They’ve convincingly shown that these were very small individuals.”
The hobbits are considered to be one of the last early human species to become extinct, making them a fascinating subject for researchers studying human evolution.
