Lions and Tigers in India

[GuateGojira]

Exactly, in India, where lions and tiger lived together (using the classic theory), they actually don't compete at all. There is not a single traditional history, nor even in the old Indian books, of tigers fighting lions. In the book "Tiger the ultimate guide" of Valmik Thapar (2004), Romila Thapar states that in the Mahabharata, for example, it is known of tigers fighting other tigers and even against elephants and buffaloes, but tigers and lions in combat with one another are not mentioned.

In chapter 4 (Mrigaraja: King of Beasts), Divyabhanusinh (2005) explain how the lion came to be the king of the animals in India, however, it clear that this point of view born completely from the influence of the cultures of west Asia which influenced the first Indian cultures, but not from India itself. Again, there is no mention of any fight or conflict between the tiger and the lion.

In fact, Divyabhanusinh consider that the godess Durga with the tiger as a ride is an "aberration" as her original mount was a lion, however, this is because the "original" incarnation of this goddess came from the ancient cultures of west Asia and can be traced up to Egypt. In this case, the influence of the tiger, despite the claims of Divyabhanusinh and Mitra, was so great in India that they even changed the mount of Durga of a lion for a tiger! Valmik and Romila Thapar clearly show this in Valmik's book of 2004 and in the great "The Penguin History of Early India from the origins to AD 1300" from Romila, which mentions several times the tiger but there is practically no evidence of lions in ancient Indian art.

So, independently if we believe or not that tigers and lions DO shared territory in ancient India, they lived in two completely different habitats and certainly avoid each other. Besides, the ecological adaptations of each of them and they hunting methods makes a mix impossible. However, the Ranthambore - Kuno area are a unique place and combine the two habitat type and there is were conflict can arise, in theory.
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