The Eurasian cave lion is an extinct feline.
It was one of the largest cats ever to have walked the earth, even bigger than the Siberian tiger (=Amur Tiger). It can be compared to the Liger (though it, most probably, was still bigger). It is the biggest lion to have ever existed (about 25% larger than the biggest of today’s African Lions).
Most facts of this huge cat are, of course, derived from fossils (Although we still don't know much about them). The specimens found were, in length, about 3,5 meters (11.5 ft). A female specimen weighed approximately 175 kg (385 lb), a male roughly between 270 kg (600 lb) and 320 kg (700 lb).
The cave lion lived throughout Europe and Asia, ranging from England to Siberia.
It lived from 300,000 to 10,000 years ago, becoming extinct about 10,000 years ago. Although there are some indications that it only became extinct about 2000 years ago (if this is true, it would have lived in the Balkans).
The reason for their extinction was most probably the change of climate, as the Ice Age came to an end. It may be that they were hunted down by primitive people (such as the Neanderthals), though that seems unlikely, considering the height and weight of these predators they would not have been an easy prey to humans. They would have been very difficult to hunt down, even if humans hunted together (which they did). The cave lion, too, lived in a pack (a pride), and if you consider that they could take down an old or young (infant) Mammoth, you can see that they weren’t easy prey.
They hunted, mostly, large herbivorous animals, such as: Horses (primitive species though) and (as I have said) old or young mammoths.
We can derive from paintings, found in Germany, that the cave lion had a mane. The fact that Cave lions had faint tiger-like stripes, we know because we discovered an ivory figurine of a human wearing a lion pelt (the figurine was discovered in France). Eurasian Cave Lions inhabited steppes and parkland regions in the north and semi-desert areas in the south of Eurasia.
Latin term (also the scientific classification name): "Panthera leo spelaea" (meaning “cave Lion”)
References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_lion
http://www.messybeast.com/cat-prehistory.htm
Also Jean M. Auel’s books (They are fictional but contain many accurate prehistorical facts) :