The Astonishing Micropygmies

Abstract

The stunning discovery of a Late Pleistocene hominin skeleton, on the Indonesian island of Flores has thrown the anthropological world into a frenzy. The primitive and derived features of the skeleton, but most curiously its tiny stature suggest a new species of diminutive Homo erectus called H. floresiensis. In a provocative Perspective, Jared Diamond provides a scintillating synthesis of the evidence for a new H. erectus species and debates the reasons why the fossil remains of this pygmy hominin have only now been discovered.