Why the new fossils shed light on evolution of Flores ‘hobbits’

Approximately 700,000-year-old fossils from Indonesian island of Flores reveal long history of enigmatic 'hobbits'

It was August 2003 and we were at the Hotel Sindha in Ruteng on the Indonesian island of Flores. We were sitting on the verandah drinking tea and passing around a strange tooth that had just been unearthed from nearby Liang Bua cave. It was clearly human in origin, but unlike the tooth of any person living or dead. We had no idea that this fossil was from a creature that would soon rewrite our understanding of human evolution.

A few weeks later, on the 2nd of September 2003, the dig at Liang Bua uncovered the partial skeleton of a tiny, small-brained human adult. Now it was clear where the mystery tooth had come from. That fossil had been unusual, but the remains of this individual were truly extraordinary. A year later, the world was introduced to a previously undiscovered human species: Homo floresiensis, the Flores 'hobbit'.