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Cats In The History

Cultural depictions of cats

The cultural depiction of cats and their relationship to humans is as old as civilization and stretches back over 9,500 years. Cats have figured in the history of many nations, are the subject of legend and are a favorite subject of artists and writers. Black cats have been associated with death and darkness.

Earliest history

Cats were originally domesticated because they hunted mice who would eat stored grains, protecting the food stores. It was a beneficial situation for both species: cats got a reliable source of prey, and humans got effortless pest control. This mutually beneficial arrangement began the relationship between cats and humans which continues to this day. While the exact history of human interaction with cats is still somewhat vague, a shallow grave site discovered in 1983 in Cyprus, dating to 7500 BCE, during the Neolithic period, contains the skeleton of a human, buried ceremonially with stone tools, a lump of iron oxide, and a handful of seashells. In its own tiny grave 40 centimeters (18 inches) from the human grave was an eight-month-old cat, its body oriented in the same westward direction as the human skeleton. Cats are not native to Cyprus. This is evidence that cats were being tamed just as humankind was establishing the first settlements in the part of the Middle East known as the Fertile Crescent.

Ancient Egypt

Cats, known in ancient Egypt as the mau, played a large role in ancient Egyptian society. They were associated with the goddesses Isis andBast. Cats were very commonly depicted in art and routinely mummified.

China

Cats that were favored pets during the Chinese Song Dynasty were long-haired cats for catching rats, and cats with yellow-and-white fur called 'lion-cats', who were valued simply as cute pets. Cats could be pampered with items bought from the market such as "cat-nests", and were often fed fish that were advertised in the market specifically for cats.

Europe

Folklore dating back to as early as 1607 tells that a cat will suffocate a newborn infant by putting its nose to the child's mouth, sucking the breath out of the infant.

Black cats are generally held to be unlucky in the United States and Europe, and to portend good luck in the United Kingdom. In the latter country, a black cat entering a house or ship is a good omen, and a sailor's wife should have a black cat for her husband's safety on the sea. Elsewhere, it is unlucky if a black cat crosses one's path. White cats, bearing the colour of ghosts, are conversely held to be unlucky in the United Kingdom, while tortoiseshell cats are lucky. It is common lore that cats have nine lives. It is a tribute to their perceived durability, their occasional apparent lack of instinct for self-preservation, and their seeming ability to survive falls that would be fatal to other animals.

Cats were seen as good luck charms by actors, and the cats often helped cure the actors' stage fright.

Classical folklore

The Greek essayist Plutarch linked cats with cleanliness, noting that unnatural odours could make them mad. Pliny linked them with lust, and Aesop with deviousness and cunning.

Middle Ages

Since many equated the Black Death with God's wrath against sin, and cats were often considered in league with the Devil due to their aloof and independent nature, cats were killed in masses. Had this bias toward cats not existed, local rodent populations could have been kept down, lessening the spread of plague-infected fleas from host to host.

Vikings used cats as rat catchers and companions.

A medieval King of Wales, Hywel Dda (the Good) passed legislation making it illegal to kill or harm a cat.