Cecil & Jericho

Cecil and Jericho were two unrelated male lions who formed a coalition in Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park and became, through Cecil’s death, the best-known lion partnership in the world. Both wore research collars and were followed closely by Oxford University’s Hwange Lion Research Project.

They began as enemies. Jericho was one of the Askaris, a coalition of a father, Mpofu, and his sons Jericho, Judah and Job, who killed Cecil’s brother in 2009. By 2013 both had fallen on hard times: Cecil had been driven from the Backpans pride by Bhubesi and Bush, and Jericho had lost Judah and Job to trophy hunters. Instead of fighting, the two old males teamed up. The bond was uneasy at first, but they became inseparable, and together they held the Ngweshla pride and, from late 2014, the Somadada pride.

The partnership ended on 1–2 July 2015, when Cecil was lured out of the park and killed by a trophy hunter. Jericho stayed on in the Kennedy area, where he formed a new pride with a young lioness, and died of natural causes in October 2016, at about 12½.