Felis Catus.

Cats are dangerous companions for writers because cat watching is a near-perfect method of writing avoidance. ~Dan Greenburg

I adore cats but I own one of the loopiest cats around. They suffer from a god complex & it has scrambled their brains. Issi's are more scrambled than most.

The Egyptians were so mad about cats they worshipped them, which is a little extreme. One story says the Persians put cats in their front line of battle & the Egyptians lost the war because they wouldn't hurt a cat. The Egyptians were more than a little weird. So I'm not a big fan.

The Egyptians weren't the first to domesticate cats though. In 2004 there was a grave excavated in Cyprus that contained 2 skeletons; one was human & the other was feline. They date back 9 500 years. Cats were domesticated sooner than dogs & have been human companions for longer.

All domesticated cats descend from 5 self domesticating wildcats (felis silverestris lybica) who originated in the Near East (The Mediterranean, Iran, Anatolia) & hunt over 1 000 species. Their sense of smell is 14 times stronger than humans.

Apart from the purr the cat has contributed some of the best words in the English language ~ gib, a neutered male; catling (yes, it's a word, medieval English for kitten ); & clowder for a group of cats.

The things I never knew!