THE SHORT-HAIRED DOMESTIC CAT. The domestic cat in history and legend. Part 1.

    If we try to discover the reasons why the wild cat should have become a domestic animal, we meet with widely differing causes according to the historical period and the individual country.

    When, some 4,000 years ago, the Middle Kingdom Egyptians moved southwards up the Nile to attack the fabled land of Kush (Nubia), to seize the gold that was to make Egypt rich, they also encountered there the Nubian Kaffir cat. Whereas the Nubians called it ‘Gadiska’, the Egyptians simply named it after its voice, ‘Mu’.

THE SHORT-HAIRED DOMESTIC CAT. The origin of the domestic cat. Part 4.

    It is, therefore, evident that between the time when cats are first known to have been kept and the point at which they became domesticated an intervening period of some thousands of years elapsed, far longer, that is, than for any other domestic animal. This may be attributed to the known fact that the cat is not sociable, but lives an aloof, independent life. The presence of the domestic cat in Crete some 4,000 years ago has been established, as has its presence in China some 2,500 years ago, where it was introduced by way of India.

   The house cat appears in ancient Chinese literature of about 800 BC. Like the tiger, which destroys the wild boar in the open country, the cat is revered as sacred for its extermination of destructive mice. Moreover, at this time the cat is a symbol for longevity. Throughout successive dynasties until approximately 200 BC, the strangest rites accompanied the worship of the cat and the tiger.

   In Ancient Greece the cat does not seem to have been very common but in Roman times it became more widely known and spread throughout the empire. Domestic cats were probably introduced into England by Roman colonists.

THE SHORT-HAIRED DOMESTIC CAT. The origin of the domestic cat. Part 3.

    Cats were found in excavations of sites in Jericho (Jordan) dating from the late sixth millennium or early fifth millennium BC. By the beginning of the third millennium BC, cats seem already to have been much more widespread. These regions were inhabited by further sub-species of wild cat, which may well have  also been the original form in that area. It is very likely, however, that in all these early instances the cats must be regarded simply as tamed wild animals. For there is a distinct difference between mere taming, an accidental habituation to man, of which any animal is capable, and a continuing domestication process lasting over generation.

    Finds of artifacts and paintings from the Badari culture in the Egyptian New Stone Age, dating from 4000 BC, show that Kaffir cats were kept at that time. With the New Kingdom in Egypt, finds and representations become increasingly frequent, which suggests that cats were being introduced into the home, a genuine domestication. Egyptian tomb decorations depict the cat assisting at the hunt, as a pet, as a companion to man and as a divine symbol. Given the cat’s territorial orientation, an important precondition of its domestication was, therefore, that the people seeking to achieve this should be settled in one place, which of course they were during Egypt’s period of high culture. No doubt the cat was also tamed by nomadic tribes in many other parts of Africa, but this never amounted to true domestication.

THE SHORT-HAIRED DOMESTIC CAT. The origin of the domestic cat. Part 2.

    The first stages in the domestication of the cat can be thought some 4,000 – 4,500 years ago in Ancient Egypt along the upper Nile. Until recently the sole original form was thought to be the local Kaffir cat, a light-colored species, Felis lybica, from the north African desert wastes. Since early times this Kaffir cat has displayed a stronger association with man than any other sub-species of wild cat, including our European wild cat. The Kaffir cat is undoubtedly an ancestor of our domestic cat, but in all probability not the only one. Thus, a further possible ancestor is another wild cat, the creamy-grey African wild cat, Felis ocreata, from the highlands of Ethiopia.

     It has been claimed that cats were kept in the Near East considerably earlier than in Egypt. The oldest known representations of cats from Anatolia, date from 6,000 bc. Then statuettes were found at Hacilar, depicting women playing with cats, which suggested that cats have now been associated with man for more then 8,000 years