Leo (constellation) thus, the warriors' clubs, swords, and spears were rendered useless against it. Realizing that he must defeat the Lion with his bare hands, Hercules slipped into the Lion's cave and engaged it at close quarters. When the Lion pounced, Hercules caught it in midair, one hand grasping the Lion's forelegs and the other its hind legs, and bent it backwards, breaking its back and freeing the trapped maidens. Zeus commemorated this labor by placing the Lion in the sky. The Roman poet Ovid called it "Herculeus Leo" and "Violentus Leo". "Bacchi Sidus" (star of Bacchus) was another of its titles,
American lion modern lion, making it one of the largest known felids. The American lion was designated by American paleontologist Joseph Leidy as "Felis atrox" in 1853. Hemmer proposed the trinomen "Panthera leo atrox" in 1974, which was later supported by Kurten in 1985. The American lion was initially considered a distinct species of Pantherinae, and designated as "Panthera atrox" , which means "cruel" or "fearsome panther" in Latin. Some paleontologists accepted this view, but others considered it to be a type of lion closely related to the modern lion ("Panthera" "leo") and its extinct relative, the Eurasian cave lion ("Panthera leo