A Cat's Tale: A Journey Through Feline History

THE GOLDEN AGE:

CATS IN PREHISTORY AND ANCIENT EGYPT

We cats have been allies to humankind for a very long time, and while you have reserved the sobriquet man’s best friend for the dog, I may now provide you reasons to judge differently. In fact, archeological evidence offers hints that felines have been your companions for as long if not longer than canines—or to put it this way, the partnership between cats and humans is older than currency, older than man’s use of metals, and older even than written language. It dates to the very foundation of civilization itself, and we might reasonably argue that without our assistance, your civilization may not have gotten very far. Human pride is such that you assume this is bluster on my part. But consider the view of your great ancestors in the matter, being so thankful for our presence that they believed us to be representatives of deities. We have arrived in the glory days, my friends, when humans and cats together marched from the most humble of beginnings to heights undreamt.

These early feline companions were descended from Felis silvestris lybica, a common wildcat found in the Near East and North Africa. Only slightly larger than a modern domestic cat and sporting a tawny coat with brindled markings, our great-grandfather many times removed would not be too terribly different in appearance from a tabby such as myself. But despite all the virtues we domestic cats possess, I am forced to acknowledge that comparing us to little Felis pays him a grave disservice. He was as cunning and quick as only a wildcat can be, and with a strength that greatly belied his size. You humans who are impressed by a modern cat’s ability to bring in a lizard now and again would find Felis possessed of skills that would put ours to shame.

But why wouldn’t Felis be a fierce and dangerous hunter? There’s something about thirteen million years of evolution that tends to leave a cat pretty well adapted to its environment. And we house cats in turn claim a direct line of descent from him, which makes humans far our juniors. Homo sapiens is a mere three hundred thousand years old in comparison, so pardon us if we seem periodically snooty, but we’re well aware that we have been tested and crafted by time. And to counter a common misconception on your part, I’ll have you know that big cats evolved only three million years ago, so any of you who consider domestic cats to be a lion or tiger cut down to size need to think again. When it comes to felines, it was the small who begat the large.

Another issue you may need to rethink is the idea that humans domesticated us. Sorry, the truth is we domesticated ourselves. Felis did not need your help to survive, and as he was no dummy, you certainly would not have succeeded in tricking or coercing him into accepting your company. Rather, he willingly entered into your communities, and on recognizing that a mutually beneficial relationship could exist between felines and humans, he agreed to stay. In fact, rather than the term domestication, I would prefer we use partnership. As I’ve noted in our introduction, isn’t it much closer to the truth, after all? But let me tell you the story and we’ll see if you don’t concur.

It was during the tail end of prehistory, the Neolithic, when humans in Mesopotamia began to practice agriculture, and this development would have many consequences. For one thing, it required that you cease your wandering ways and establish the first towns and villages. Oh, how your pride would sink if you could see those conclaves of huts constructed of mud and twigs—why, you were practically living in grandiose beaver lodges! But I do give credit where it is due: you tended your crops brilliantly, establishing such a surplus of grain that it would alter not just your own evolutionary path but those of all the species around you.

Among them were rats and mice, crafty types whose nefarious doings we will hear much of in our story. Scavenging from your excess was easy pickings, and they soon began gravitating around your dwellings. In typical human fashion you hadn’t thought things through. You had considered with great astuteness the growing of crops, but nary did you ponder if anyone else might want to eat them! And without any plan, you were caught off guard. Silent, nimble, and scarcely seen by your eyes, the greedy little vermin took what they wished and often spoilt the rest.

So you despaired. But not for long—because little Felis offered a solution. If you didn’t want those rodents, he was glad to take them off your hands. They were an important food source for him, you see, and since there was an undeniable advantage in having his quarry massed in predictable locations, he began to congregate around your settlements as well. Of course, he was initially wary of your kind. And to be fair, you can’t fault him. Consider yourselves through feline eyes. You are big—huge, even! You lumber about on two feet in a manner that seems to the more dexterous species to be nothing but clumsy, and, even more off-putting, you’re loud. I won’t go so far as to call you boorish, but you must admit you lack subtlety when it comes to dominating the world around you.

But little Felis had no lack of fortitude. He dared approach your homes in search of prey, and in the process found an additional advantage. For your own security you had been eliminating large and dangerous mammals from the outskirts of your villages, and this had the effect of creating a safe haven for smaller predators. This was a place where cats could prosper, Felis realized! In your orbit he became an apex hunter, blessed with an ample supply of game and a limited threat from larger animals. And as he decimated the rodents who had decimated your grain, the foundation for a symbiotic relationship between felines and humans was laid.

Of course, even if each provided benefit to the other, it didn’t mean that the path leading to home and hearth would be trod quickly or easily. Just as Felis was reticent to trust the notoriously unpredictable humans, it’s also a safe bet that prehistoric people were more than a little leery of him. Your great ancestors were well aware that while wildcats were small in stature, they were well equipped with claw and tooth. If Felis could eviscerate a rat with a single swipe, what he might do to a human hand?

But the relationship prospered in spite of such trepidations. After all, the last thing you wanted was for us to leave, lest you again become inundated with rodents. So if we hunted too well, you began to leave scraps of food from your tables for us, to ensure that we stayed nearby. Cuttings of prepared meat would have seemed a peculiar meal to a prehistoric cat, but then again they were tasty, and the fact that they miraculously appeared made life all the easier, so Felis accepted the offer. I doubt either could see it, the process occurring too slowly, but human and feline were becoming increasingly reliant upon each other. A cat’s affections are of course won slowly, and in the case of little Felis, it would have taken the passage of centuries. But as the relationship grew ever closer, the end result was inevitable.

If you will permit a bit of romantic vision, I imagine the historic breakthrough occurring on the outskirts of a ramshackle village in perhaps Iraq or Syria, some ten thousand years ago. Let us say sometime after midday, with the sun still high after warming the fields. I envision a man looking out toward the brush where the domain of humans officially stops. This is the border of his world, the place beyond which wildness lives, and as he squints into the shadows he sees bright eyes peering back. They are everywhere, hidden among the bushes and branches: dozens of eyes, sparkling green and almond-shaped. He knows of them, he and the other villagers having seen them countless times before. These eyes belong to the ones who prey on the rodents who prey on the crops.

Then a sudden flurry, and amid the scampering of paws the eyes disappear. Just as they always seem to when the man catches a glimpse of them. But this time there is something different. This time … one pair of eyes remains. These eyes are bold, they do not flinch and they do not waiver, instead staring back from the shadows as the man stares into the brush. The man bends low, squaring down on his haunches. Never has he seen the eyes so clearly as now. Slowly, as fear mixes with exhilaration, he reaches his hand forward with an open palm. And just before him, at the very edge of his domain, stands little Felis. Ah, if the humans were curious about the eyes in the shadows, for how many generations had Felis and his kin been curious about the big, loud creatures standing among the fields? And he, equally filled with fear and exhilaration, steels his courage and steps forward, his body emerging from the brush.

The man’s palm now descends. Slowly, slowly, oh so slowly—he knows what those claws can do, and he has no desire to be swatted by them. At the same time, Felis pushes his head upward, and the hand lands gently between the cat’s ears. Just a touch, and then the fingers brush the neck and glide onto the back. Oh, a new sensation! The man’s hand, cracked and callused from his labors, revels in the exultant feeling of the soft, plush fur. And … that will be enough of that! Felis vanishes back into the shadows, and the man’s fingers grasp only emptiness, as the two nervous partners leave their encounter at nothing more than a simple stroke. It ends so quickly, a mere moment in time. Who could have guessed that with such a simple gesture two worlds were forever