The history of cats in Egypt and Ancient Times

The history of cats in Egypt is a murky one, forgoing the obvious absense of prehistoric cats right now it all really began in Egypt around 5000 years ago when one particularly savvy cat looked upon the grain stores of humans and figured out that there may be mice running around, and where there are mice...there are lots of them. Since the cat figured that humans did not like mice in his grain it was only a short leap to the assumption if savvy cat eats the mice then cat will be tolerated, and even welcomed.

This started a millenia long relationship between small African cats and strange bipeds that has lasted down the centuries to modern day.

Around 4000 years ago the cats started migrating, since they had been so successful at catching mice and rats they had been allowed to stay with humans but this also posed a problem...there were many, many cats underfoot and the food supply was running out so when they started travelling elsewhere they found new territories to colonise and this led to European, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern and Asian varieties coming into force.

The history of cats in the Dark Ages

Fast forward about 3,500 years and we come to the dark ages, a time human populations had exploded and trade was everywhere, and with that many new diseases and with that came Yersinia pestis; the most lethal of all otherwise known as the Black Death. The problem for these Dark Age cats was that before this some bright spark in the church has decided that cats were evil and should be hunted down. Because the flea that carried the disease was living on rats and most of the cats that would've eaten them were now no more the disease spread and spread.

The history of cats in the New World

A short time later though cats did start to be seen as good to have around since they kept pest populations down and they were left alone and they eventually got taken to the New World across the sea. Because a ship is a closed area a cat that is going to terrorise the rat populations is a good thing for sailors however there is some debate as to whether it was such a good thing for local wildlife populations.

The history of cats in Modern Times

In time cats started to be treated as dogs are and they got taken into the home and treated with the respect they deserve, if they did not exist the world would be a very different place.