Drawing so many smilodons lately made me think of this old sketch study and thought I’d dig it up. I drew this when the whole lip theory began, as a thought experiment as I wasn’t overly keen on the dog like lips people were sketching, but ended up never posting it as some people were being attacked for now ‘inaccurate’ sabertooths and I didn’t want to contribute to it. I believe the theory has now been disproved however so I feel safe in posting it.

Whether or not the theory is right I still find it a fascinating idea because it could potentially answer an enormous question, a question so big, that probably only I have wondered it. Why is there no cave art of sabertooths? I mean, people back then were the exact same people we are today, and we’re completely fascinated with sabertooths! People of all cultures have been fascinated with predators, and we have plenty of cave paintings of cave lions! Surely a more fearsome version, with huge bared fangs would capture their attention? I just find it a really difficult concept to believe that there is no art. But, what if the reason there is no art is because they didn’t look that different from lions? In fact we do have one contender, a statuette frequently reported as a cave lion purely for the lack of visible teeth:
http://78.media.tumblr.com/5c61207e8e8ece4aecb860a564c0454b/tumblr_inline_p36tpsTwYb1qiknv9_400.jpg

Now I don’t know about you, but every thing about this looks distinctively non-lion, and arguments for it’s shape (such as lack of tail) are purely because the shape of the rock seems really weak. To me, personally, this looks exactly like a Homotherium and it’s difficult to see it otherwise.

Now of course there are other reasons why we might not have sabertooth art; we might just not have found it. It might have faded or eroded away to nothing, or waiting in some undiscovered cave. It may have been made in a material that just couldn’t survive the passage or time, or in a bad spot for preservation. We do not have surviving art old enough in North America to capture the most spectacular of cats, the Smilodons, but we have evidence that Neanderthals lived alongside Homotherium, and Homosapiens would have encountered them, even if rarely. So why no art? These are the questions that keep me awake at night!

Back to the art, most of these were quick scribbles and shouldn’t be taken too seriously, but the skulls at the top I at least I tried to make fairly accurate, and used cat scans and x-rays of living felines to try to reconstruct the soft tissue of the three main sabertooth families, and our current living sabertooth. What did I find? It was actually pretty easy to cover the teeth without ridiculous exaggeration in most cases, and the canines of the clouded leopard actually seem equa or maybe longerl (in my very inexpert opinion) relative to it’s skull to Homotherium’s, yet show no signs of visible teeth, so I think it’s very possible that Homotherium had no visible teeth (much to my own disappointment, I love these cats). It’s hard to tell for certain as nearly all paleoart reconstructs sabertooths as snarling/hissing/roaring, but I feel in general there is also a tendency also to give sabertooths minimal lip; because we gotta show off those sabres! As a side note I’ve apparently always drawn sabers with more then average lip, which I guess is cool. Does this really change anything for me? Not really. Until we find a frozen sabretooth there’s no way to tell for certain how their mouths were, but it wouldn’t be the first time we got something completely wrong! What I wouldn’t give to see the past!

TL;DR - Hel is really fascinated by nature and overthinks everything (even if they rarely write it down).