Can plant based diets build muscle and strength?

Most people would have a hard time believing any person of great size or strength didn't eat meat or other animal products, because to the stereotype of the weak, scrawny vegan. This is because we've been conditioned to believe that in order to grow muscle and strength, you need to eat a lot of animal protein, and that animal protein is the sole source of protein.

Of fact, as anyone who has ever seen a (herbivorous) silverback gorilla may clearly deduce, only one of those two notions is correct.

Most people, on the other hand, appear to believe that humans are more like lions, who require meat or some other sort of animal nutrition