| Well, most people think that lions only come from Africa. |
| And you would be forgiven for thinking this, |
| because in fact, most lions do come from Africa. |
| But this hasn't always been the case. |
| If we go back 10,000 years, we would find that there were lions roaming vast sections of the globe. |
| But now, unfortunately, |
| only very small sections of the lions' former habitat remain. |
| My particular interest is Asiatic lions, |
| which are a sub-species of African lions. |
| It's almost 100,000 years since the Asiatic lions split off and developed as a sub-species. |
| At one time the Asiatic lion was living as far west as Greece |
| and they were found from there, |
| in a band that spread east through various countries of the Middle East, |
| all the way to India. |
| In museums, you can now see Greek coins that have clear images of the Asiatic lion on them. |
| Most of them are dated at around 500 B.C. |
| However, Europe saw its last Asiatic lion roaming free 2000 years ago. |
| Over the next nineteen hundred years the numbers of Asiatic lions in the other areas declined steadily, |
| but it was only in the nineteenth century that they disappeared from everywhere but India. |
| So, how can you tell an Asiatic lion from an African lion, |
| with which you're probably more familiar? |
| Well, in general, Asiatic lions are not as big as African lions. |
| The colour is more or less the same, but the appearance of the mane is different - |
| that's the hair around the lion's face and neck. |
| The Asiatic lion's mane is noticeably shorter than the African lion's. |
| Asiatic lions also have a long fold of skin on their undersides, |
| whereas not many African lions have this. |
| Well, I'd like to talk to you now about the Gir Sanctuary in India. |
| That's where I've just come back from. |
| The sanctuary was established specifically to protect the Asiatic lion. |
| It's 1.450 square kilometres in area and most of it is forest. |
| There are now around 300 Asiatic lions in India |
| and almost all of them are in this sanctuary. |
| But despite living in a sanctuary, which makes them safe from hunters, |
| they still face a number of problems that threaten their survival. |
| One of these is the ever-present danger of disease. |
| This is what killed more than a third of Africa's Serengeti lions in 1994, |
| and people are fearful that something similar could happen in the Gir Sanctuary |
| and kill off many of the Asiatic lions there. |
| India's lions are particularly vulnerable because they have a limited gene pool. |
| The reason for this is interesting - |
| it's because all of them are descended from a few dozen lions that were saved by a prince |
| who took a particular interest in them. |
| He was very wealthy, and he managed to protect them - |
| otherwise they'd probably have died out completely. |
| When you see the Asiatic lion in India, |
| what you sense is enormous vitality. |
| They're very impressive beasts |
| and you would never guess that they had this vulnerability when you look at them. |
| The Asiatic lions don't have the Gir Sanctuary to themselves, I should add. |
| They actually share it with about 2000 farmers. |
| A significant proportion of the lions' diet is made up of the livestock of these farmers - |
| goats, chickens and so on - |
| as much as a third, in fact. |
| And they've even been known to attack humans, especially in times of drought. |
| One final piece of interesting information - |
| in ancient India, one of the greatest tests of leadership for a man was to fight a lion. |
| Now it seems, in modern India it will be a great test to see if the lion can be saved. |
| I'm sure this is something that all of you will share concern for too. |