Capital with figures (David?)

Scholarly research has offered differing interpretations of this capital. Some of the scenes remain indeterminate not least because of their poor state of preservation.
The figural group on the north side depicts, for instance, David with the severed head of Goliath before King Saul. The scene on the west side has been read either as Samson’s battle with the lion or as Hercules’ battling the Nemean lion. However, it may also conceivably be David who liberated a lamb from the jaws of a lion. The figure on the south east corner leads a large animal with a leash, which is probably a bear with its young.
The pair of wrestlers on the north east corner is severely damaged. Only the shoulder and part of the head of the fighter behind is preserved and he is almost completely covered by his opponent. The figure in front is being grabbed by the hip and thrown with great force onto his side so that he is situated horizontally with legs bent.
In both posture and bodily form, as well as in the pronounced vertebrae of the spine, the figure is clearly related to the one found on the base of the door jamb of the façades of both Saint-Gilles (Languedoc-Roussillon) and Saint-Trophîme in the Provençal city of Arles.
While both contemporary examples from southern France depict a battle between lions, the presence of two male figures wrestling with one another at Monreale, as is the case in the so-called Mithras Capital S22Sh71, suggests a motif-based adaptation of the source without any iconographic connotations.

David Goliath king Saul Samson battle lion bear Hercules Nemean-lion Provence Mithras Arles lamb Saint-Gilles France Saint-Trophîme