Cats are living history, really. A domestic cat is closer to its wild cousins than dogs are, in fact. Perhaps that’s because they chose to domesticate, rather than were domesticated. It’s true.

Think of the circumstances of other historical domestications: Dogs were initially wild pack animals who either rejected or killed weaker members of the pack. Lucky for us, really. We were able to take those cast offs, those rejects and make them into loyal companions to aid us in hunting from the very earliest days, 100,000 BCE  or more.

To a degree we still use dogs to hunt, though they are less instrumental to modern hunting. Cows and other cattle were dragged into domestication as were horses, pigs, goats, sheep, llamas and chickens. But cats were attracted by the inventiveness of humans — our ability to manipulate our surroundings to better suit our needs.

Cats are very recent domestics, really, having wandered in from the forests of the fertile crescent some 6,000 years or so ago. They were hunting the rodents and other vermin who thrived on our agricultural systems. They emerged in cities like Ur, Uruk, Babylon and Nineveh. It was not human effort which gathered the cats, at least not at first, but rather cats’ consent to live in the “happy hunting grounds” of human habitation.

By the 3rd millenia BCE, cats had become indispensable to human agriculture in Egypt, China and the Indus valleys. Egyptians were so enamored with cats and their ability to rescue humans from a blight of vermin that they created the goddess Bast, a human woman with a cat’s head. It was also illegal to kill a cat and if a family’s cat died, Egyptians shaved their eyebrows to mark their grief and loss.

Cats paced the halls of the palaces of the Pharoahs and even became mummies in their own right, traveling to the afterlife in a manner similar to humans. Cats, with their silent steps and alien-seeming eyes were also considered gateways to the spirit world by none other than the founders of Democracy, the Greeks.

Originally, Greeks kept polecats (Mustelids related to weasels) as leashed guardians of grains. Slowly, cats filtered into Greek society and replaced polecats, probably in trade with Egyptians or Persians (since cats were also used on ships to prevent vermin infestations).

Cats were adopted into Greek society where they became associated with Hecate, goddess of the moon, crossroads and darkness and administrator of the underworld (lieutenant to Persephone). According to Greek legend, a woman named Galenthias was transformed into a black cat by Hecate so that she could see into the spirit world as much as the “real” world. It is perhaps the influence of cats’ spirits that we get one of the most interesting anecdotes from the Middle East.

The Prophet, Muhammad (PBUH) is said to have been extremely fond of cats. In fact, one Hadith (a saying or deed of the Prophet) holds that one day during the call to prayer, the Prophet’s cat Muezza was asleep on the sleeve of his robe. Rather than wake the cat, the Prophet cut the sleeve off and went to prayer.

In fact, compared to other domestic animals, cats are fairly well revered in Islam Dogs are considered unclean because of their proclivity to eat garbage and carrion while donkeys and goats are used as an insult. It is said that when the Prophet died, cats came out of the desert to sit at his grave site and (supposedly) cats can always be found near his grave site in Medina today.

Everywhere cats went, their mystical reputation followed; even along the old silk roads all the way to Japan.

Maneki Neko is the beckoning cat of Japanese lore who is always associated with good fortune and luck. One legend has it that an old priest lived in a dilapidated temple and, despite having little food, always shared with his cat, Tama. One day, the priest had run out of food and complained wearily to the cat, prompting the cat to walk out of the temple, into a gathering storm.

A rich Samurai was traveling along the road and had taken shelter under a large tree. While resting he noticed the cat in the rain, with a paw raised as if beckoning to him to enter the temple. Curious, the Samurai left the shelter of the tree to see why the cat was waving to him. Moments later, a deafening clap of thunder rent the air and lightning split the tree asunder. The cat had saved the Samurai’s life.

Scooping the cat up, the Samurai entered the temple and asked the old priest if he owned the cat. The priest acknowledged the cat was his, despite fearing the cat had somehow angered the Samurai, and the Samurai declared Tama the harbinger of good fortune. The Samurai’s family became benefactors of the old temple, completely reversing the fortunes of it, the priest and Tama.

Europeans, more ambivalent and afraid of cats, still believed cats affected human fortune, usually for the better.

In the early modern era, no sea-faring captain would go to sea without a good rat-catcher on board, and while dogs (such as terriers) were used on ships often, it was cats who garnered the most attention and lore. Sailors believed that if a cat washed its ears vigorously, there was a storm coming. Likewise, if a cat approached a sailor, the sailor would have good luck that day. If, however, it approached him half way only to retreat, he was sure to have bad luck.

Ships’ captains came to regard cats and their presence as part of the superstitions needed to run their ships efficiently. If a crewman ever threw a cat overboard, the sailor was certain to follow at the order of the captain.

Though many medieval hysterics believed that cats were symbols of Satan, many kings and nobles believed the opposite. In fact, Charles I of England believed that his cat brought him good luck, even detailing a guard to keep it safe. The day after the cat died, Charles I was arrested by Oliver Cromwell’s forces and later executed for treason.

In New England, the wives of fishermen would keep black cats to prevent their husband’s death at sea through some calamity — which, ironically, may have brought about many of the ill rumors which were used to persecute women during the various Witch Hunts (such as the famous Salem Witch Trials) of the 17th century.

Human fascination with this egalitarian and mystical relationship carried over into literature, art, science, and politics.

T.S. Eliot, Ernest Hemmingway, Alexandre Dumas and Charles Dickins all kept numerous cats. In fact while Hemmingway is celebrated as the most macho of writers, he housed some 30 cats in his Key West home. T.S. Eliot’s “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” became “Cats” (the musical) under Andrew Lloyd Weber’s direction. Winston Churchill’s cat, Marmalade, used to travel with him and always slept in bed with him. Pierre August Renoir is famous for including cats in his portraits as is Theophile Steinlen (“Le Chat Noir” posters everywhere owe him a debt of gratitude). Tchaikovsky and Chopin were both inspired by cats running across a piano and penned musical tributes to their cats. Nicolai Tesla was inspired to research electricity after he received a shock from his cat, Macak. Percy Shaw, an English inventor, developed the “Catseye” device upon being inspired by the way light reflected in cats’ eyes from all angles. His invention is used on bicycles and in roadways where Americans call them “reflectors.” And Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) said it best when he noted “they (cats) are the cleanest, cunningest, and most intelligent things I know, outside of the girl you love, of course.”

Cats are at once our boon companions and yet a hair’s breadth (or perhaps, whisker’s breadth) away from their feral roots. A dog lost in the city will trot up and down streets, looking for its master (or a friendly face) for some time before reverting to its wild nature. Cats, however, barely touch paw to grass before they re-imagine themselves tigers stalking prey.

Invariably, the way that we carve out a comfortable niche in the world attracts cats: Skulking and half-wild, they are coaxed by the lights of civilization — entranced, perhaps — much like their wild ancestors thousands of years ago.

On silent, slippered paws they meander into our lives, check up on our progress, take what is offered, give what they feel like you need, perhaps stay a while, connect us to our original Bronze-age roots and just as quickly are gone again.

In Memory of Chuck, 2001 - 2009