Anatomy of a lion (Ellenberger, 1901).

Drawing or sculpting animals can be difficult, even harder when your subject is a carnivore and your intent is to pose the animal in a way that exposes all of it's power, when the animal feels threatened and is ready to attack! You need to know a lot about it's muscle structures, and obviously a whole lot about it's bones and the way the skeleton holds the masses together in different positions.

Lucky for me, I recently found an excellent source on animal anatomy, which included many detailed illustrations on quadrupeds and carnivores. The plates below come from the classic German 'Handbuch der Anatomie der Tiere fur Kunstler', a five volume set written by Professor Dr. Wilhelm Ellenberger and published by Theodore Weicher in Germany in 1901.

Ellenberger was born in 1848 and studied veterinary medecine in Berlin and Vienna after which he was appointed professor of physiology and histology at the Veterinary School in Dresden in 1879. His impressive anatomical studies and accompanying detailed illustrations are still highly respected today.

Below are several of the detailed anatomical studies of a lioness found in Ellenberger's work. I've also included five pages which describe in detail all parts of the animal, including muscle groups and bone structures of the legs and head. Click to enlarge any of them.