#*gritting my teeth* sometimes you have to be a little unwell to be mentally well

[cloverplover]

the fellowship of the ring (family: felinae) :3

"lore" below the cut

so much thought went into this and i couldnt tell ya why!

all the cats shown are members of the subfamily felinae of felidae, which basically excludes big cats like lions and tigers (that can roar). since in lotr canon the fellowship takes place time-wise sort of after all the big players have come and gone, i think that all the remaining races would be smaller cats in comparison, to emulate that vibe of the end of an era. each character of a different race has a different genus- including boromir and aragorn, because a lynx is basically a fancier caracal and i thought that was funny.

felis, the housecat genus that the hobbits are in, actually has quite a few species, so i imagine that in this universe the more housecat you are, the more respectable a hobbit. however some cats (tooks!) are a bit more related to wild cats, hence why pippin looks like a sandcat.

gandalf, true to the books, is just sort of doing his own thing- everyone probably has a theory on what kind of cat he is but he won't confirm or deny any of them. aragorn knows but won't admit it. saruman, on the other hand, i imagine as a cheetah :3

the dwarf family also includes leopardus, which is small spotted cats. i chose a pallas cat for gimli (and then regretted it when coloring) because i thought it fit his vibe too well to pass up, but maybe thats just his family tree, who knows. i imagine them all with geometric spot patterns, better than how i drew gimli's, and very broad shoulders.

caracals are the only living member of their genus, so i also give cougars to men. maybe the house of rohan gets them. up to interpretation!

anyway. on to your regularly scheduled programming