Is Sarafina from a neighboring Pride?

[ScarLoyal]

Sarafina and Nala have a different appearance to the Pride-landers, they have much peachy-beige fur colors, they have a slender physique and a noticeable trait is their 'uncolored paws'.
So did Sarafina come from a neighboring Pride and was given the chance to betroth her daughter to the prince of the Pride-lands and become apart of Mufasa's Pride?

[Carl]

I don't think their physical appearance separates them from the pride... they were pretty similar to the other lionesses. However, it is possible that she came from another pride. Disney did not include Nala's father because they thought people wouldn't notice and it wouldn't be necessary to create such a character, but they did not intend for people to assume that Scar or Mufasa was the missing father. Considering this, the "other pride" theory is fairly reasonable and logical.

[SimbasGuard]

I have always believed that Sarafina was from a different Pride, In fact being that her daughter was chosen to be the next Queen of Pride Rock. I think that Sarafina was ether a Royal in her former Pride or at least a lioness of great importance.

[it means no worries]

Doesnt Sarabi also have that kinda colours and physique as Sarafina or am i imagining that?

[TheLionPrince]

[quote="it means no worries"]Doesnt Sarabi also have that kinda colours and physique as Sarafina or am i imagining that?[/quote]

Sarabi's pelt fur appears to be dusky brown while Sarafina's fur looks more pale. Sarabi's paws are colored, while Sarafina's paws are not. Sarabi's eyes are orange (not seen in the picture below though) while Sarafina, in the close-up shots, are green. They both have a strong physique, though Sarafina heavily resembles her daughter, Nala, when she is an adult.



As for the topic, they're just character designs. Honestly, Sarafina looks no different from the usual lionesses in Mufasa's pride despite having paler fur colors and colorless paws, though they were colored during Scar's eulogy over Mufasa (and Simba). It's possible she came from a different pride since the identity of her mate is left to speculation, and she certainly agreed to have Nala betrothed to Simba.



It never occurred until now that Sarafina could be of royalty from a different pride now that SimbasGuard has mentioned. Given how absolute monarchies work, the regent monarch had their children marry other royal heirs of different kingdoms. Something like that could occur in The Lion King universe, though that would make Nala a princess, which is never noted during the movie.

[ScarLoyal]

[quote]Sarabi's pelt fur appears to be dusky brown while Sarafina's fur looks more pale. Sarabi's paws are colored, while Sarafina's paws are not. Sarabi's eyes are orange (not seen in the picture below though) while Sarafina, in the close-up shots, are green. They both have a strong physique, though Sarafina heavily resembles her daughter, Nala, when she is an adult.[/quote]

Its interesting because though Sarabi appears as a dusky brown in the 'bath scene'. I think her actual colors are more brighter than we thought.



It makes sense because Sarabi was resting under a tree which made her look more darker.

[TheLionPrince]

[quote="ScarLoyal"][quote]Sarabi's pelt fur appears to be dusky brown while Sarafina's fur looks more pale. Sarabi's paws are colored, while Sarafina's paws are not. Sarabi's eyes are orange (not seen in the picture below though) while Sarafina, in the close-up shots, are green. They both have a strong physique, though Sarafina heavily resembles her daughter, Nala, when she is an adult.[/quote]

Its interesting because though Sarabi appears as a dusky brown in the 'bath scene'. I think her actual colors are more brighter than we thought.[/quote]

I suppose. Sarabi's pelt fur does look beige in some scenes.

[S1mb4 D4 L10n]

Even though I am also not an advocate for applying scientific laws to animated movies ( ), I can tell you how Sarafina can be from the same pride using normal normal biology. Its really simple mendelian genetics, as far as we know this (color) could be a recessive trait that was passed to her by a crossing of two heterozygous genotypes. This is shown by this punnett square



This in mind, it seems that the color of paw and the fur color is inconsistent throughout the movie so the probability of the eye color is 25% assuming that it is a recessive trait. I must say, that there is only so much we can infer about a gene pool by only their phenotypes! Recessive alleles could easily be hidden for multiple generations in heterozygous genotypes. There are 2 main ways we can find these genotypes

1.) We can see multiple controlled examples of crossbreeding.

2.) Sequence their Genome.

Obviously 2 is out the window, but maybe if we see more TLK generations pass, someone with time on their hands can construct a gene pool of the pride. All this said, the people who made TLK were probably not thinking about laws of inheritance. Even though I love science, there is no need to apply its methods to an animated film. It may be fun, but lets not say that it actually suggests something that isn't actually there. You know what i'm saying?

[Gemini]

^ Good point, Sage.

That said, though, the lineage of most of the lions and lionesses in the movie is left pretty open. So there's several plausible theories about the origins of Sarafina and Nala. I'll try to delineate them.

- Sarafina was from another pride and came over with Nala. Here the premise seems to be that Nala and Sarafina are completely unrelated to the rest of the pride but Mufasa accepted them. Given Mufasa's nature, it seems probable enough, not to mention that it would add more genetic variety to the pride. If Sarafina was a princess, though, this would go along with the fairly common historical trend of betrothing the princes and princesses of one country to those of another to create peace. As someone pointed out, this would make Nala a princess and Sarafina a queen (or perhaps a princess herself), and they could have come as part of a treaty. True, this is never mentioned, but then, there are a lot of things that don't seem to be talked about in the movie, so...

- Sarafina is a part of the pride, but Nala's father is a rogue. In real life, this wouldn't be as plausible, considering that there's generally one or two male lions that mate with all the lionesses in a pride. However, the lions in this movie tend to display a more loving, mongamous structure of one mate for every lion. This is fine, except that it creates a notable sex/gender imbalance (seeing as Mufasa and Scar are presumably the only males in the pride, unless you count the books). So if she was born and raised in the Pridelands, then there was either another lion in the pride that was never mentioned, or she had a mate who simply wasn't a part of the pride. ...Or she was a mate to one of those two.

- Sarafina is a mate to Mufasa or Scar. Realistically, this one is plausible, but given the pains Disney took to avoid incest in TLKII, this one is probably not the one used in the movie. However, Zazu does mention that betrothal (ie, of Simba and Nala) is part of a tradition 'going back generations'. What does he mean by that, exactly? It could be a reference to Theory #1, in which those from other prides are betrothed to the sovereigns at Pride Rock - a trend continued with Kiara and Kovu's betrayal - but it could also mean that Sarafina was betrothed to someone in the royal family... presumably Scar, since Mufasa had Sarabi (who might also have been a princess from another pride, hence her 'different' looks). Yes, this does make Simba and Nala related, but it would also give a nod to the customs of traditional 'blue-blood' royals, who wanted to keep the title of sovereign within their own family. Given that people often make Scar Nala's father anyway, this one seems to be a popular fan theory, and it would make sense in a real lion pride... it is only within the continuity of TLK that it becomes strained.

In my own fanfic universe, I've played around with Nala and Sarafina's origins, since it is pretty open-ended. Generally I accredit light fur, brown tail tufts/manes, and green eyes to desert lions, and thus make Sarafina and those like her (including her siblings and other OCs of mine) from another pride. But this is by no means concrete. In my first fic, in fact, I made Mufasa Mheetu's father and added a whole relationship facet between Scar and Sarafina. But to be honest, I've kind of chosen #2 as my default theory, since it's the simplest and hence most likely to be true (Occam's Razor!). I would usually go with that one, though obviously any of these could be explain her origins.

Just my thoughts. :3