Hunting for "The Hobbit"

[n2doc]

March 8, 2010

Hunting for "The Hobbit"
LIANG BUA, Indonesia (AP) -- Hunched over a picnic table in a limestone cave, the Indonesian researcher gingerly fingers the bones of a giant rat for clues to the origins of a tiny human. This world turned upside down may once have existed here, on the remote island of Flores, where an international team is trying to shed light on the fossilized 18,000-year-old skeleton of a dwarf cavewoman whose discovery in 2003 was an international sensation. Her scientific name is Homo floresiensis, her nickname is "the hobbit," and the hunt is on to prove that she and the dozen other hobbits since discovered are not a quirk of nature but members of a distinct hominid species.
"They butchered the animals here," said the researcher, Rokus Due Awe, studying the toothpick-sized rat bones possibly left over from hobbit meals. Behind him, workers carried out buckets of soil from a cathedral-like cave festooned with stalactites, 40 meters (130-feet) underground. The discovery of Homo floresiensis shocked and divided scientists. Here apparently was a band of distant relatives that exhibited features not seen for millions of years but were living at the same time as much more modern humans. Almost overnight, the find threatened to change our understanding of human evolution.



more big pics at

http://www.sacbee.com/static/weblogs/photos/2010/03/hunting-for-the-hobbit.html

[damyank913]

1. My Precious...screw the hobbit, where's the ring.

[tomg]

2. Last I heard, Rahm had it. nt