Where did the relationship between humans and cats, which has had a profound influence on the development of both species, begin? Well, that’s a difficult question to answer, as there is evidence which hints that humans and cats were living alongside each other much earlier than we may imagine.

Deborah Blake notes that “There is evidence that wildcats first lived among people over 100,000 years ago in Mesopotamia”, while John Bradshaw states that “It is likely that the first people to tame wildcats were the Natufians, who inhabited the Levant from about 13,000 to 10,000 years ago”. Herbie Brennan points to “southern Cyprus where excavations of a 9,500-year-old burial have unearthed two skeletons: one of a human, the other of a cat”.

However, the first written evidence of some form of domestication of cats is from the Egyptians, “whose meticulous record-keeping leaves us with little doubt that there was definitely a developed relationship between cats and humanity in the earliest days of their civilisation” (Brennan). At this stage, the cat’s main role was to help preserve grain stores from being eaten by rodents and other vermin, although we can see from the earliest surviving name for a cat that they weren’t simply working animals and were held in high esteem. The first recorded cat name is “Nedjem”, dating from around 1400 BCE. It’s a surprisingly lovely name, translating from Egyptian as ‘sweet’ or ‘pleasant’. Yes, the first recorded name for a cat is, essentially, ‘sweetie’, something we still call our cats to this day. In fact, cats were so beloved by Egyptians that if a cat died, the humans in their household went into a period of mourning.

Conversely, we can feel the absolute joy of the seventeen-year-old Emperor Udo of Japan when he wrote the following about his cat on March 11, 889CE:

Taking a moment of my free time, I wish to express my joy of the cat. It arrived by boat as a gift to the late Emperor, received from the hands of Minamoto no Kuwashi. The colour of the fur is peerless. None could find the words to describe it, although one said it was reminiscent of the deepest ink. It has an air about it, similar to Kanno. Its length is 5 sun, and its height is 6 sun. I affixed a bow about its neck, but it did not remain for long.

In rebellion, it narrows its eyes and extends its needles. It shows its back.

When it lies down, it curls in a circle like a coin. You cannot see its feet. It’s as if it were a circular Bi disk. When it stands, its cry expresses profound loneliness, like a black dragon floating above the clouds.

By nature, it likes to stalk birds. It lowers its head and works its tail. It can extend its spine to raise its height by at least 2 sun. Its colour allows it to disappear at night. I am convinced it is superior to all other cats.

Udo’s reaction is that his cat is the best in the world. Don’t we all live as a feline that we think is ‘superior to all other cats’?

We see evidence of this adoring relationship between humans and their companion cats around the world. The Prophet Muhammad loved his cat Muezza so much that, rather than disturbing her when she had fallen asleep on his robe, he cut the sleeve off so that she could continue to sleep in peace. Chinese emperor Zhu Houcong erected a tombstone to his beloved feline, Xuemei, when they died. Lexicographer Samuel Johnson famously worshipped his cat, Hodge, a statue of whom now stands outside his London home. Similarly, writer Edward Lear, who composed the charming nonsense poem The Owl and the Pussy Cat, clearly adored his cat, Foss, and saw cats as “a symbol of joy and life”.

The first decades of the twenty-first century have seen cats become the second most popular pet on the planet. In terms of how we refer to ourselves, we are no longer ‘Cat Owners’ but ‘Cat Parents’. Cat Moms and Dads go online with pictures of their felines and create incredibly popular content on social media. This has become such a popular pastime that it has spawned several cat ‘celebrities’ and there is even a Wikipedia page devoted to the subject of cats and the internet!

There have also been changes to the way that we keep cats, with around ten percent now being kept indoors as house cats. These changes in the way we perceive and keep cats are leading to changes in the way cats behave. While some people have concerns about such changes, insisting that cats should be allowed to behave according to their natural instincts, it’s worth noting that cats have been adapting and evolving to the needs of humans for thousands of years. As Desmond Morris wrote, this has led to the cat leading something of a double life:

In the home, it is an overgrown kitten gazing up at its human owners. Out on the tiles, it is fully adult, its own boss, a free-living wild creature, alert and self-sufficient, its human protector for the moment completely out of mind.

As you may know, a cat’s meow is a remnant of kittenhood which cats don’t tend to continue as adults, unless they live with humans. Similarly, cats will pummel or knead their human owners, another action from kittenhood when they knead their mothers’ bellies to stimulate the flow of milk.

It’s clear that cats don’t see humans as their owners but as surrogate parents, and it seems that this is a role which we humans are more than happy to fulfil!

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After trying a number of spiritualties, Andrew discovered Druidry in 2015. He is a Druid with the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids and is the current editor of the order’s magazine, Touchstone. He moved to Stratford-upon-Avon in 1996 and has lived there ever since. He has recently retrained as an Environmental Manager to put his love of nature and the environment to practical use . Andrew loves story-telling in all its forms, whether it be poetry, novels, theatre, film or TV. He enjoys going to open mic events, reading his poetry and hearing the work of others. He loves working with the spirit of a place and loves spending time in the nearby Cotswold hills.