REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, BANDUNG -- The local authority and experts are yet to identify the prehistoric human fossils found recently in Soa Basin, Ngada Sub-district of Flores, East Nusa Tenggara.
"We still need complete data. But, based on its teeth fossils, it classifies as Homo sapiens," Fachroel Aziz, an expert on vertebrate of the Geology Museum of Bandung, stated here on Wednesday night.
The expert team is still studying whether the pre-historic human fossils had any relation to Homo floresiensis as the two have a similar short stature.
"We hope further research will be conducted to help us find the other fossilized remains and name it," Aziz remarked.
The fossils, believed to belong to the first and oldest prehistoric human living in the region, were found along with stone tools dating back to some one million years in the Soa Basin.
Based on the discovery, the experts believed that such prehistoric humans might have communicated with each other.
"Flores has been isolated from both the Sunda and Australian shelves. However, artifacts were found there. I think this discovery might alter the view according to which prehistoric humans could not speak," Azis pointed out.
Meanwhile, a researcher of Wollongong University of Australia Gert Van den Bergh stated that the discovered fossilized remains of the human in Soa Basin bore similarities to Homo floresiensis.
However, only teeth, a piece of jaw, and some fractions of skull were found.
"We hope to find the remaining parts," Bergh affirmed.
The discovery would interest geologists and researchers across the world as it would shed new light on the life of prehistoric humans, Bergh added.
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