(Felis spelaea), an extinct predatory mammal of the family Felidae. The cave lion lived in Europe and northern Asia during the second half of the Pleistocene and the beginning of the Holocene. It was the same size as the modern lion or tiger, but its skeletal structure, particularly the skull, had features of both types of cats. Consequently, the cave lion is sometimes called the tiger-lion. That name is perhaps more accurate because the animal did not live in caves but on plains and piedmonts.