Sptd. Lions

[Porphyre]

The page 19 Optional encounter tables mention twice the "Sptd. Lions".
To a non-English-speaking layman like myself, could anyone tell what "Sptd." stands for?

[Torreny]

I would hazard to suggest "SPoTteD" lions?

[Porphyre]

All right. The only mentions I found about prehistoric lions were about Cave lions, I suppose the two are synonyms?

[waysoftheearth]

Spotted Lions are more-or-less to Lions what Sabre-Toothed Tigers are to Tigers:

Spotted lions are large, fierce, dappled versions of the lion. They are generally found in the plains of the Pleistocene epoch, and rarely occur elsewhere.

www.dotd.com/mm/MM00029.htm

[Porphyre]

Thanks.

[Leonaru]

In my OD&D write-up, I turned the spotted lion into a larger and stronger version of the common lion (effectively the dire lion).

[Porphyre]

I know that later editions "dire-ified" all kinds of beast, but I had teh notion that the "dire wolf" (Canis dirus) was an actual Pleistocene animal. "Dire wolf" in the Encounter tables just means "prehistoric wolf" along with the Cave bear and the Sabre-toothed tiger.

[cadriel]

There are several candidates for a spotted lion.

The Congolese Spotted Lion or lijagulep is a double hybrid; the result of breeding a male lion with a female jagulep (jaguar-leopard hybrid). The hybrid leopon (leopard-lion hybrid) also fits the bill.

Given that this is supposed to be a mountain-dweller, the Marozi seems to fit the bill; it is a putative spotted lion that lives in mountainous areas, possibly a leopon or other hybrid. The other possibility is that it meant an American lion, which was found in La Brea along with sabre-toothed cats and dire wolves, which appear right alongside it in the Optional Mountains listing. It's not known whether the American lion had spots or not, but it would be a good fit.

OD&D came out only four years after the English release of On the Track of Unknown Animals, which is pretty much the foundational text of cryptozoology. If Gygax read that book, spotted lions could well be Marozi, which are discussed therein. Otherwise I'd be inclined to think it was an interpretation of the American lion from La Brea.

Either way, it should be a slightly bigger version of the lion, like a dire wolf compared to a common wolf.