Black and grey realistic lion head tattoo with a flowing mane on the upper arm, beside a matching smaller lion on the forearm.

Matching lion tattoos on upper arm and forearm

Realism · Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

Two lion head tattoos sit on the same person's arm, one larger on the upper arm and one smaller on the forearm. Each lion has a wavy, flowing mane that trails into swirling linework, with soft shading on the face and fur. The tattoos are almost entirely black and grey, with a small hint of warm tone near the upper arm lion's mane.

Realism Upper arm Forearm Lion Mane Lion head

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Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Come closer, the lot of you, and mind the sawdust, because it gets into everything and never leaves. You want the story of the Carrowmore Brothers' Travelling Menagerie? Then sit on that upturned crate, and I'll tell it the way old Mabel Quaile told it to me, with her cigarette going out in the corner of her mouth.

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The big cat was called Samson, though nobody ever bothered to be surprised by that. He had a mane like weather. When the wind came off the Mersey he'd lift his head into it, and the hair would stream back in long grey ribbons, curling at the ends the way smoke curls when the fire has gone to bed. The children paid a penny extra to watch him stand on the drum and let the draught pull at him. Mabel swore it was the only thing in that tent worth the admission.

The circus was dying by then, the way things do, one ticket at a time. The canvas had more patches than sky. The elephant had gone to a farm in Wales, and the clown had gone to the bottle and then to a hospital bed. Mabel sold the wagons one by one until only Samson's cage was left, and the bank manager came round with his clipboard to say there was no market for a lion that had stopped performing.

So Mabel opened the cage door on a Tuesday, walked him down to the shore road, and let the wind take the mane where it wanted. He went slow, the way a king walks through a town that has forgotten his name, and nobody stopped him. The last anyone saw was his head lifting into the spray, the hair flying out behind him like something poured.