Riddle of the Human Hobbits : An Equinox Special

Riddle of the Human Hobbits | Australopithecine Angle | We're Not Alone | Migration Mystery | Small But Perfectly Formed | Find Out More

Dr Martin Brookes

April 2005

We're Not Alone

Whatever the truth about her identity, Flo has thrown a serious spanner in the works. It was widely assumed that when the Neanderthals went extinct, about 25,000 years ago, we were left as the planet's sole representatives of the Homo genus. Yet as Flo is estimated to have died only 18,000 years ago, her discovery not only challenges that claim, it distorts assumptions about the origins of our modern selves.

The conventional story goes something like this: modern humans first walked on Earth about 150,000 years ago. Our immediate ancestors were archaic forms of Homo sapiens, who were themselves descendants of Homo erectus. This much seems incontrovertible, for the time being at least. The disputes emerge in the details. How and where did this transition from the old to the new take place?

At one extreme, the 'Out of Africa', or replacement, hypothesis argues that modern humans evolved in Africa, from where they spread out to colonise and replace archaic populations across the globe. In this scenario, everyone alive today shares a relatively recent common ancestor of African origin. At the other extreme, the multiregional model argues that modern humans evolved separately, if simultaneously, in multiple locations throughout the Old World. If this version of events is true, it implies that the common ancestor of modern humans dates back 1.8 million years to Homo erectus in Africa.

Wherever the truth lies, the discoveries in Indonesia have taken both camps by surprise. In fact, Flo is just the latest in a string of remarkable finds. It was widely believed, for instance, that Homo erectus disappeared some 400,000 years ago. But recent excavations in Java have uncovered Homo erectus fossils dated at only 50,000 years old. Did these archaic populations come into contact with modern human populations then colonising Australasia, and how do they relate to the diminutive people of Flores?

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