Comments on: Barbary lions in the Tower of London

By: Gary Griffith

Gary Griffith — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 18:49:04 +0000

Fascinating piece and fascinating blog. I love London history and run a website on London called celebrate London http://celebratelondon.net and I absolutely adore the Tower of London. They have recently installed some model baboons at the tower to mark the opening of the Royal Beasts Exhibiton. Anyway, good luck with your blog.
Gary

By: livius drusus

livius drusus — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 18:52:09 +0000

I’m afraid it may to late to establish a genetically viable population from the few remaining individuals. They would be extremely inbred.

By: Larry

Larry — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 18:42:19 +0000

Its not to late to breed the few Barbary Lions left in the world. It would be great to rescue this beautiful cat.

Larry

By: Pete

Pete — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 22:15:32 +0000

I’m sad that there aren’t any more of those lions in the Wild… I’m pritty sure that you could get better studys of the Lions in the Wild than in Captivity.

By: livius drusus

livius drusus — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 16:44:01 +0000

I’m not so sure gift animals for the Royal Menagerie would necessarily be good examples of larger market structures like trade routes and agreements. They could easily have ended up in a special shipment from ruler to ruler.

Unless they can find some specific reference to the Barbary lions in period documents, I don’t see how they could know anything at all about how they got there.

I think about that stuff too, Shea, like how poachers would be hung for catching a rabbit in the Royal Forests. It’s amazing to think about that kind of callous wealth and control contrasted with regular people’s lives.