What is the name of the extinct "hobbit" hominid found in Indonesia?

The extinct “hobbit” hominid found in Indonesia was Homo floresiensis. This small-bodied human relative lived on the island of Flores, where its remains were discovered in Liang Bua cave.

A joint Indonesian-Australian excavation team found the first recognized skeletons in 2003. The species was formally named in 2004, with the nearly complete skeleton known as LB1 serving as the type specimen. An adult represented by LB1 stood roughly 1.1 meters tall and had a remarkably small brain, yet the fossils were associated with stone tools and evidence of sophisticated behavior.

The nickname “hobbit” refers to the fictional people popularized by J. R. R. Tolkien, not to a separate scientific classification. Researchers initially debated whether the remains represented a new species, a population affected by disease, or an unusually small modern human. Most paleoanthropologists regard Homo floresiensis as a distinct extinct hominin species.

The species survived surprisingly late in human evolution. The youngest known bones from Liang Bua are about 60,000 years old, while the youngest associated stone tools date to roughly 50,000 years ago. Its disappearance occurred near the arrival of modern humans in the region.