sea lion

The sea lion is not the large aquatic creature that we are familiar with today, but a regular heraldic lion with a fish’s tail. A Glossary of Terms used in British Heraldry, J.H. Parker, Oxford, 1894, Entry:Monsters (In fact many new mythical creatures were created by heralds by prefixing them with the word “sea” and adding a fishtail!). Its meaning can be taken to be the same as the land-based king of the beasts.