Within the couple of months one of my close friends, Sophie Jackson, left for Vietnam for 6 months to teach English to the local schools and universities. The main thing about Sophie is her almost unnatural obsession with cats and she claims that Vietnam is jam packed full of them. She alone has inspired me to dedicate this blog about cats and why, in her eyes, they are so majestic.
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| Sophie and her cat Kitty Karyall |
Cats, where to begin such a broad topic... logically a brief history would be a good place to get the ball rolling for this blog. Today cats are what seems to be a common, easy to care for pet but the domestication of this feline dates back to the Ancient Egyptians 4000 years ago where they domesticated cats to keep way certain types of pests and protect food supply's. If one were to kill a cat the penalty would be death as they were worshipped as gods/goddesses. They were so respected they were even mummified like humans after death!
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| Sekhmet - Egyptian Goddess of War |
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| Mummified Cats |
This respect for the domestic feline spread later to other countries throughout Europe before reaching the Pilgrims in the New World. Different species spread to alternate places for example long-haired domestic cats originated from Turkey and Iran where as short-haired domestic cats originated from Egypt and further spread to Japan, China and India.
There was a time in history where cats were not so admirable and were surrounded by various negative superstitions. During the middle ages cats were seen to be associated with the devil and evil doings mainly relating to witchery and cats being thought to be the familiar of a witch.This caused a eradication of a large scale for cats during these times. However as time passed these myths passed and cats were once more a common house hold pet by around the 18th century.
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| A Witch and Her Familiar |
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