Flores man

Homo floresiensis ( ), also known as "Flores Man" or "Hobbit" (after the fictional species), is an extinct species of small archaic humans that inhabited the island of Flores, Indonesia, until the arrival of modern humans about 50,000 years ago.

The remains of an individual who would have stood about 1.1 m (3 ft 7 in) in height were discovered in 2003 at Liang Bua cave. As of 2015, partial skeletons of 15 individuals have been recovered; this includes one complete skull, referred to as "LB1".

The ancestors of H. floresiensis are suggested to have arrived on the island around 1.27–1 million years ago. It is now generally accepted that the small body size of H. floresiensis is the result of insular dwarfism, a common phenomenon among island animals. It has historically been debated whether H. floresiensis was the dwarfed descendant of Javanese Homo erectus, or whether it represents an otherwise undetected migration of small, Australopithecus or Homo habilis-grade archaic humans outside of Africa.

This hominin was at first considered remarkable for its survival until relatively recent times, initially thought to be only 12,000 years ago. However, more extensive stratigraphic and chronological work has pushed the dating of the most recent evidence of its existence back to 50,000 years ago. The Homo floresiensis skeletal material at Liang Bua is now dated from 60,000 to 100,000 years ago; stone tools recovered alongside the skeletal remains were from archaeological horizons ranging from 50,000 to 190,000 years ago. Other earlier remains from Mata Menge date to around 700,000 years ago.

From the Wikipedia article “Homo floresiensis” (en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Homo_floresiensis&oldid=1384638087), by Wikipedia contributors, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0). This block is kept separate from our own text.