00:03we are homo sapiens but before our species walk the earth there were many others that came before
00:09one of those is called homo floresiensis and they were our smallest cousins experts believe they
00:14only stood around three and a half feet tall and they hunted and gathered as far back as a million
00:19years ago living alongside our species in some areas as recently as just 50 000 years ago however
00:25an adult bone fragment found in 2013 raises some questions about them as it is extremely small
00:31even for this tiny species experts say the creature the bone belonged to likely only stood three feet
00:36three inches tall with the researchers saying about it this 700 000 year old adult humerus is
00:42not just shorter than that of h floresiensis it is the smallest upper arm bone known from the hominin
00:47fossil record worldwide they say this could point them on the path to better understanding their
00:52species one that the researchers say is poorly understood archaeologist adam brum says the best
00:58theory at the moment is that this species evolved when a group of the early asian hominins known as
01:03homo erectus somehow became isolated on this remote indonesian island perhaps one million years ago and
01:08underwent a dramatic body size reduction over time
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