October Monster Challenge 2011
Originating from Persia, then lifted from the Greeks, comes the chimeric monster, the Manticore, a common monster trope for fantasy campaigns and artwork.
The Manticore is described as a lion with the head of a bearded man, with five rows of sharp teeth and a barbed tail that it uses like scorpion;s stinger, while deploying its barbs like an archer. Sometimes its winged, sometimes its not. Sometimes it has dragon's feet, sometimes a lion's feet. Sometimes it hasa dragon's tail, sometimes it has a scorpion's tail. Other than that, its still a monster capable of devouring its victims whole, like a constrictor snake.
For my depiction of the Manticore, I used the lion's body and face while combining the dragon's armor plating, wings, and barbed tail. I also played on the idea that the Manticore is a leonin creature that is extremely obsessed with being human that they don human masks and adopt human mannerisms and customs that should a human call on their non-human appearance or see their true face, the Manticore will devour the offending human. I also wanted to create a gender type for feline bodies. human head creatures with the Manticore being male and the Sphinx being female. That's the line of thinking I was doing with my creation of the Manticore.