In 2003, a joint Australian-Indonesian archaeological team discovered the remains of a diminutive human species, Homo floresiensis, nicknamed the “hobbits”. These early humans stood only three feet seven inches tall and lived on Flores, an Indonesian island. Scientists attribute the hobbits’ small size to island dwarfism, an evolutionary process favoring smaller bodies that need less food. After living on Flores for 650,000 years, the species went extinct about 49,000 years ago.

It was formerly believed that the hobbits used fire and stone tools, and that they hunted dwarf elephants and large rodents. The use of fire and coordinated game hunting are considered milestones in human evolution, and early archaeological evidence suggested the hobbits exhibited these behaviors despite their small brains.

However, a study in Science Advances published this year reevaluated the archaeological evidence, finding no proof of fire use and concluding that coordinated hunting was unlikely. Analysis of tool cut marks indicated that the hobbits were scavengers that waited for Komodo dragons to make kills. Thousands of giant rodent bones from their cave sites lacked any charring or burn marks, showing no signs of human-controlled fire for cooking.