Hobbit feet.

The New York Times has nothing better to do than look at hobbit feet:

The new anatomical evidence, being reported Thursday in the journal Nature, is unlikely to solve the mystery of just where the species — formally designated Homo floresiensis — fits in human evolution. That fact even the researchers acknowledge, and some of their critics still contend that the skull and bones are nothing more than remains of modern pygmy humans deformed by genetic or pathological disorders.

The controversy erupted almost immediately after the H. floresiensis discovery was announced in 2004. The single skull was unusually small, indicating that its brain was no bigger than a chimpanzee’s. It topped a body little more than three feet tall.

Now the examination of lower limbs and especially an almost complete left foot and parts of the right, the researchers reported, shows that the species walked upright, like other known hominids. There were five toes, as in other primates, but the big toe was stubby, more like a chimp’s.

Stranger still was the size of the feet — more than seven and a half inches long, out of proportion to its short lower limbs. The imbalance evoked the physiology of some African apes, but it has never before been seen in hominids.

And, naturally, they were *hairy* feet, too.

Tags: archaeology, paleontology