Posted on 07/15/2020 5:45:13 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
A loner and a hunter with highly developed territorial instincts, a cruel carnivore, a disobedient individual: the cat. These features make the species averse to domestication. Even so, we did it. Nowadays, about 500 million cats live in households all around the world; it is also difficult to estimate the amount of the homeless and the feral ones.
Although the common history of cats and people began 10,000 years ago, the origins of the relation still remain unknown... Scientists from the Institute of Archaeology at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun have outstanding merits in this field. An article discussing significant research achievements in the area has been published in PNAS, a prestigious official journal of the National Academy of Sciences. The first author is Dr Magdalena Krajcarz who has made an attempt to find ancestors of domestic cats in Neolithic Central Europe. By analyzing cat diet, she is trying to check how close they cohabitated with people...
It does not mean, however, that cats had entered into no relations with people even earlier. The first, best-documented domesticated cat remains on the territory of Poland date back to the beginnings of our era. The animals are believed to have spread across Central Europe mainly due to the influence of the Roman Empire. Nonetheless, the earliest cat remains in the area date back to even 4,200-2,300 BC and evidence the first migrations of the Nubian cat which originally inhabited the Near East and North Africa. This particular species is considered as the ancestor of domestic cats in Central Europe.
(Excerpt) Read more at eurekalert.org ...
Good one.
Smartest cats Ive ever seen were in Kabul. Survival of the fittest generation after generation. Some were more like dogs except you never knew when they would stop purring, turn and bite/scratch.
Cats were highly revered in ancient Egypt as protectors against many things - I believe that I once read that they were considered protectors against infectious diseases.
in addition to tasting like chicken ...
Cat’s and humans living together? Probably started at my house. We’ve got seven of them.
Well, they start off with a major error:
“Even so, we did it.”
People domesticated horses and dogs. Cats doemesticated themselves.
Bump
I'm not so sure "we" did it, maybe it's more like cats were self-domesticated.
Assumptions ....the KEY word throughout the article.
More like, cats moved and demanded to be fed.
My golden retriever says cats are evil.
If you want on or off this list, please let me know.
I wouldn’t know. And I certainly hope that you don’t, either.
That’s just a testimony to the higher-level intelligence of the Cat.
Cats don’t need a ‘leader’. They lead themselves.
Oooo, she’s cute. (Needs to lose that hand tat, tho.) A little earlier, our grandson went out for a swim in the pool. When he came in, a little ribbit followed him in the door. (Between our pool and the neighbor’s bass pond, we have a small city of them living around here.) My wife was sitting there, and one of our cats suddenly jumped out of the chair and started doing some St. Vitus Dance in front of her. Backflips, chasing in circles, generally chimping out. She figured he finally went over the cliff. (He’s been kinda borderline since he was a kitten.) Then she saw Michigan J. Frog bouncing along, and Mr. King Of The Jungle didn’t know what to make of it. The frog hopped over to the screen door and casually squeezed back outside under the weatherstripping. The cat’s gonna be twitchy for a week now. LOL
They do tend to hover in the same vicinity.
I guess the point is they, as most “cat” species, can operate independently. They don’t need others, per se.
But yes, they can be quite social.
“would stop purring, turn and bite/scratch.”
Sounds like my boy. He thinks fighting is playing and why the humane society almost paid me to take him. He’ll nap in my lap for an hour or two then turn on me.
AW HELL NAW
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