Our ancestors may have killed off the last remaining Hobbits, or Homo floresiensis, an obscure human-like species that stood only three-feet tall and weighed 75 pounds, according to a new study.
These dwarf-like hominoids were first discovered in 2003 by scientists excavating at the Liang Bua cave site located on the Indonesian island of Flores. At the time, scientists found evidence suggesting that these newly discovered species lived alongside humans until about 11 centuries ago. However, analysis on newer excavations reveal that these "hobbits," originally thought to be humans suffering from dwarfism, Down's syndrome or some other growth-stunting disease, went extinct 50,000 years ago.
Scientists in the previous study came up with their timeline by analyzing the chemical makeup of the soil surrounding the fossils. However, new research reveals that dating from the previous study is most likely inaccurate because the soil used to analyze date the Hobbit remains were not evenly deposited.
"At the time of the initial discovery, not enough of the older deposits had been exposed, and this led to an error in the interpretation of how the dates obtained at that time applied to the sediments that contained the hobbit remains," said researcher Matthew Tocheri of Lakehead University in Canada.
Instead of focusing on excavating on the cave's center and eastern wall like previous studies, the researchers from the latest study focused on digging towards the back of the cave.
Besides expanding the excavation site, Tocheri and his team used several dating methods, including uranium-series dating and infrared stimulated luminescence methods, to reveal that the Hobbit skeletal remains were from 60,000 to 100,000 years old and the artifacts or simple stone tools that they left behind were around 50,000 to 190,000 years old.
"The youngest Hobbit skeletal remains occur at 60,000 years ago but evidence for their simple stone tools continues until 50,000 years ago. After this there are no more traces of these humans," co-researcher Maxime Aubert said.
Aubert said that the latest findings suggest early humans may have been involved in wiping out these pint-sized hominoids.
"Homo floresiensis seems to have disappeared soon after our species reached Flores, suggesting it was us who drove them to extinction," he explained.
"These results are tantalizingly close to the earliest evidence for modern humans in the region, which might suggest a causal link to the subsequent disappearance of H. floresiensis," said Tom Higham, an archaeological scientist at the University of Oxford.
While experts believe that humans and Hobbits really did live side-by-side on the island of Flores, the researchers said that more studies are needed to see if we were really the culprit of Homo floresiensis extinction.
"They might have retreated to more remote parts of Flores, but it's a small place and they couldn't have avoided our species for long. I think their days were numbered the moment we set foot on the island," said co-researcher Adam Brumm.
"It's a smoking gun for modern human interaction, but we haven't yet found the bullet," said co-lead researcher Richard Roberts, a geochronologist at the University of Wollongong in Australia.
The latest findings were published in the March 30 issue of the journal Nature.
