Woman with Cat, 1908 - Kees van Dongen
In a new study that National Geographic shares, DNA analysis of cats shows that they have lived with humans for thousands of years, and this has had little effect on their evolution. The home cat's genes have changed very negligibly compared to the wild cat's genes. Scientists have researched DNA from the remains of more than 200 cats for the past 9,000 years, including ancient Romanian cats, Egyptian feline mummies and modern African cats. It turns out that two large generations of cats are the ancestors of today's domestic cats, as we know them today, according to Nature Ecology Evolution. The early ancestors of today's domestic cats spread from Southwestern Asia and Europe back in the 4,400 BC. Probably cats began to hang around the farming communities about 8,000 years ago, where they established mutually beneficial relationships with humans against rodents. Mice and rats were heavily attracted to the crops of human civilization, and cats probably followed the populations of rodents and were increasingly approaching the populated areas. This is the first encounter between humans and cats. It's not like people have taken a few cats and put them in a cage.
The second line consists of African cats that dominate Egypt and spread around the Mediterranean and most of the Old World around 1500 BC. This Egyptian cat has probably behaved as appealing to people as social and reliability. Probably, prehistoric human populations have begun to transport cats along land and sea trade routes to control rodents. Surprisingly, the comparative analysis of cat's DNA in history does not show great differences in the genetics of wild and domestic cats, and one of the few distinctive features distinguishing them is the hair pattern. The study sheds light on the late appearance of spots and stripes that begin to appear in domesticated cats in the Middle Ages.
Woman with a Siamese Cat (La Dame au Chat Siamois), 1924
The genus of the classic and most popular today's dark gray coloring of the cat dates back to the Ottoman Empire in Southwest Asia and later became commonplace in Europe and Africa. It was not until the 18th century that the mark of the modern cat became common and began to associate with the domestic cat, and in the 19th century people began to select cats to create different breeds. In general, cats become a tamed companion of humans, but without changing much, says the evolutionary geneticist Eva-Maria Gaiel. Domestic cats are similar to wild cats, but they are not self-conscious but tolerant to humans and others of their species. Although it is easy to collect a herd of sheep, it is difficult to collect a flock of cats.
This is in contrast to the dogs - the first domesticated animals. The dogs are chosen by the people to perform specific tasks, something that never related to cats. This selection of specific skills has led to the diversification of dogs in many breeds, as we all see today.
I think we did not have to put cats on such a selective selection as they did not need to change. They were perfect as they are.
Even if not everyone agrees with the perfection of cats, they are among the most popular pets in the world today, with over 74 million cats living in homes in the USA.
"The cat is a complete secret, as a beast. The dog is simple and naive as a human." -Karel Capek