Abstract
Of all the discoveries of fossil hominins, none has been more puzzling and unexpected than the “Hobbit” on the island of Flores in Indonesia. Anthropologists had no context in the fossil record in which to place it and had to grasp for analogies with a wide range of animals to make sense out of it. LB1 is an adult female that stands about 1 m tall with a brain capacity of about 400 cm3—not large for a chimpanzee and unheard of for a healthy human. As recently as 60,000 years old, this little hominin was alive when modern Homo sapiens were spreading out of Africa.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsAdditional References
Aiello LC (2010) Five years of Homo floresiensis. Am J Phys Anthropol 142:167–179
Brown P et al (2004) A new small-bodied hominin from the Late Pleistocene of Flores, Indonesia. Nature 431:1055–1061
Bunn A et al (2006) Early stone technology on Flores and its implications for Homo floresiensis. Nature 441:624–628
Jacob T et al (2006) Pygmoid Australomelanesian Homo sapiens skeletal remains from Liang Bua, Flores: Population affinities and pathological abnormalities. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 103(36):13421–13426
Larson SG et al (2007) Homo floresiensis and the evolution of the hominin shoulder. J Hum Evol 53:718–731
Moore MW, Brumm A (2007) Stone artifacts and hominins in island Southeast Asia: new insights from Flores, eastern Indonesia. J Hum Evol 52:85–102
Morwood M, van Oosterzee P (2007) The discovery of the Hobbit. Random House Australia, Milsons Point
Morwood MJ et al (1998) Fission-track ages of stone tools and fossils on the east Indonesian island of Flores. Nature 392:173–176
Morwood MJ et al (2004) Archaeology and age of a new hominin from Flores in eastern Indonesia. Nature 431:1087–1090
Morwood MJ et al (2005) Further evidence for small-bodied hominins from the Late Pleistocene of Flores, Indonesia. Nature 437:1012–1017
Wong K (2009) Rethinking the hobbits of Indonesia. Sci Am 301(5):66–73
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Langdon, J.H. (2016). Case Study 17. A Curious Isolation: The Hobbits of Flores. In: The Science of Human Evolution. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41585-7_17
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41585-7_17
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-41584-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-41585-7
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)