Real Ancient Egyptian Cat

From wikipedia the free encyclopedia the gayer anderson cat is an ancient egyptian statue of a cat which dates from the late period around 664 332 bc.

Real ancient egyptian cat. The deity mut was also depicted as a cat and in the company of a cat. Facts about egyptian cats inform the readers with a sacred animal during the ancient egyptian period. Egyptians believed cats were magical creatures capable of bringing good luck to the people who housed them. Egyptians esteemed cats from at least 5 000 years ago says jstor.

The two species eventually merged creating a new breed which was closely related to the modern egyptian mau. Cats were praised for killing venomous snakes and protecting the pharaoh since at least the first dynasty of egypt. So it is hardly surprising to find that the domestic cat evolved from egyptian and near eastern populations of african wildcats. However in this animalwised article we are going to look at present day.

All cat breeds could therefore be considered originally egyptian. Many people were even buried with their pet cats. To honor these treasured pets wealthy families dressed them in jewels and fed them. The religion which focused on the worshipping of animals such as cats flourished in upper and lower egypt thousands of years after cats had been domesticated.

Ancient egyptian cats enjoyed a sacred status in the religion of this country and cat deities existed even before the formation of the kingdom itself in 3100 bc. The jungle cat felis chaus and the african wildcat felis silvestris lybica. The goddess bastet was the cat goddess which was originally a warlikecat lioness but eventually became associated with domesticated cats. Cats of course are natural hunters who would have been protecting grain stores.

Skeletal remains of cats were found. But while egyptians are typically credited with their worship of cats and beliefs in cats magical properties this worship may have been a mixed bag for cats. Numerous statuettes such as this were made during. Egyptians shaved off their eyebrows to mourn companion cats who had died and there were severe penalties for taking the life of a cat.

They called the cats as mau. Several ancient egyptian deities were depicted and sculptured with cat like heads such as mafdet bastet and sekhmet representing justice fertility and power. The first domestication of cats took place in the fertile crescent dated back 10 000 years ago from the middle eastern subspecies of wildcat. The latter had a calmer temperament and so was more commonly domesticated than its wilder relative.

Not only is there artistic and fossil evidence for this the ancient egyptians even worshiped a cat in the form of bastet the cat headed goddess of healing and womanhood protector of the home. Cats in ancient egypt were represented in social and religious practices of ancient egypt for more than 3 000 years. The iconic image of an egyptian cat arises from objects such as the leaded bronze statuette from the metropolitan museum of art pictured below. In a time long before scientifically based agricultural techniques anything that could be done to preserve the food supply was very important indeed.

Let us get other interesting facts about egyptian cats below.