Cat Mythology: Were cats gods?

cats appear in lots of folklore and are revered by many cultures around the world with their seemingly mysterious ways capturing the imaginations of people for thousands of years and during that time they have established themselves as a very important animal in human culture and one could argue since agricultural farming a more important pet than the dog from Vikings Scandinavia to ancient Egypt and into modern day Japan cats have a fascinating history in folklore but not so well known in mythology so why is that well in this video we will explore this phenomenon and the rise of the academy mythology and some of the myths and tales surrounding these creatures so grab yourself a cup of tea and welcome to Kraken Fulton to start our journey into cat mythology we must first understand how cats appeared in our culture and became domesticated that humans had but the majority of the time the last hundred thousand years avoiding them especially the Eurasian cavelin an animal that would have no qualms eating an unarmed human and one of our natural Predators when we were hunter-gatherers but something significant happened to change things and the story of that starts around fifteen thousand years ago and this would forever change how we viewed our relationship with cats so what happened 15 000 years ago well we started to see settlements for hunter-gatherers forming communities and starting to farm and domesticate Wheats in barley amongst other grasses and this was all happening in the near East and as hundreds and thousands of years passed we farmed more and more of our grain so that by 10 000 years ago we were producing enough to have excess and this needed to be stored somewhere a quick note on farming we didn't just stop hunter-gathering and farmed 100 of our food we see through genetic archeology that we first formed a very small percentage of our grain and over time this went up from 10 of our food to 20 to 30 and so on farming didn't happen overnight it took several thousand years to become significant to our food supply and so as we farmed we needed to store this grain these stores attracted animals who wanted to eat it such as mice and rats and this in turn would have bought with it disease and depleted stores of food but nature often finds a way to balance things so this concentration of mice and rats Drew one of their natural predators and that was the cat and specifically the North African and Southwest Asian Wildcat Felix silvestrius lipica now as another side some people believe that this is also the reason why Pottery came to be has storing grain in baskets would seem to be a bad decision if protecting it against firming as these containers could easily be chewed through but Academia seems to favor The View that Pottery came to be as a product to allow the cooking of marine and fresh water animals and using it as storage for grain was secondary importance and was adopted after that and the link to the papers about this and other points in this video in the description below which is where you'll find the like button which costs nothing to press and really helps this channel so thank you very much for all those who do press it it does mean a lot and so back to these communities where 10 000 years ago our farming ancestors saw cats catching rats and mice around their stores and whilst cats weren't fully domesticated at this point this was the start of the process of humans and cats being tolerant of each other within the same environment and as tolerance turned into a form of trust and this in turn introduced selective breeding and so the cat had begun its journey into human culture and there is some evidence of this journey beginning with a burial in Cyprus where I feel Sylvester's was buried with a person and whilst the cat showed no evidence of being domesticated There is almost no doubt that the cat and a human had a bond now these cats look just like the domestic cats we have today maybe a little more muscular and a little less dose all but generally similar and even our domestic cats of today could be considered almost as wild ancestors in many their behaviors and so in effect the relationship was of convenience humans provided a good source of food and protection for the cat in a care to in turn catches pests and Vermin so let me tell you a story about the origin of animals and cats and this is from the kabila people of North Africa and this has a motif similar without early creation myths which I've made a video about now the first Buffalo and heifer emerged from the depths of the dark underworld their eyes seen light for the first time the Buffalo followed behind the heifer and after seven days he noticed that the streamer viewing from the heifer flowed backwards unlike his own due to this strange difference the Buffalo decided to examine the heifer and explored her and this led to other things that animals often do ver gave birth to a calf which grew up and eventually had a calf of their own as the Buffalo son Grew Older he became interested in mating with his mother but his old father Buffalo drove him away the Buffalo sudden sort out people and when they asked him who he was he told them his story and explained what a cow was the people listened intently explaining to the Buffalo that benefits of living wild compared to being a pet the Buffalo thought about this carefully and decided to Eternal to where his parents lived and drove his father away leaving him with his mother and sister his father ended up in the mountains where wild buffaloes were revered by people living in the caves and they drew petroglyphs of the Buffalo and made sacrifices to the buffalo the Buffalo fathers however without a wife in desperation he saw comfort with the stones of the mountain and five months later under the influence of the Sun a variety of wild animals were born emerging from the cave including seven pairs of gazelles six pairs of zebra five pairs of Rhino and many other animals the Buffalo father took care of the animals teaching them to eat grasses and roots and showed them how to copulate they multiplied and flourished but an ogre man was eventually born and from him a lion came and from the Lion came the cat and so after cats start to become domesticated in the near East we see it appear in Egypt a region that often had much influence over a portion of the near East especially the Eastern Mediterranean Coastline and so it should be no surprise that they too eventually adopted the cat into their culture in fact we can thank them for the name of the animal We Now call a cat Which derived from the Egyptian name cuata and so the Greek gatter and that's an aside the term pussycat came from the Egyptian name of an Egyptian god associated with cats called pesht but more about him in a minute so if we wind the clock forward several thousand years to around 3000 BCE or five thousand years ago we find domesticated cats in Egypt not only protecting grain stocks from Vermin but they were now appreciated for catching snakes and this looks to have increased Egyptians fondness of the cat and we should also consider that they already had cats in their culture before Felix Sylvester's leibica was introduced to them with lions leopards and cheetahs still very much respected predators in the wilderness of Egypt and Beyond and we even see Rock paintings of over 8 000 years old in the Eastern Sahara of all these cats and the people who painted these would eventually migrate into the Egyptian culture as the Sahara dried up and the Noel became the only real significant source of water and I'll talk about this more in a future video and what these paintings mean but two Egyptians all types of cat were respected in fact most animal life was respected by Egyptians but the result of this cattiness within their culture is that by 5 000 years ago a goddess in Egyptian religion called math debt had been established and she was a lion woman although often shown has been just a lion in early imagery or occasionally humanoid with a lion's head with some depictions showing her with the skin of a cheetah or leopard on her body and we first see descriptions about method in the pyramid text a collection of ancient funery texts from the Old Kingdom of Egypt which refers to mathdat as the killer of snakes implying that the domestic cat's abilities were known at the time these texts were written which was between 2613 to 2181 BCE now left it at this time was known for protecting the dead and has been linked to the mythology of Osiris whose body parts were separated into pieces and sent all over Egypt by his brother set but we do see an earlier reference to math that on seals of then from abidos and then refers to King then the first king of the first dynasty of Egypt and these Sills show math debt and this means that we know that from around 2940 BCE which was when Kingdom died math that was responsible for being the protector of his personal Chambers and so linked with the dead implying he was now linked at this time with protecting someone's home their domicile if you will and all this gives us evidence that five thousand years ago cats were firmly established in Egyptian culture and mythology now we also see a map that continued to be worshiped in Egypt to around a thousand BCE so about three thousand years ago but we also see a change a few hundred years after the death of King din when I knew goddess appears in Egyptian mythology bested and she appeared between 2890 to 2670 BCE and so during the second dynasty of Egypt and we know this as she too is also mentioned in the pyramid texts now bastit was represented as a cat or a humanoid with a lion's head at this time so there's some overlapping here perhaps even taking over some of Matthew's roles with both having connections to the sun with protection and particularly of women and their secrets and by that we're really talking about fertility and childbirth as well as Justice and we see bastet's role expand eventually becoming the goddess of cats of music and joy and her appearance starts to look more like a domestic cat rather than a lion which allows her to be distinguished more easily from the appearance of method now the role of bestit eventually aligned her to the protection of home and from evil spirits and this rise of bastard as a goddess letter there being a cult of bastet and this was based in the Egyptian city of bubustis and thus it allowed Egyptians to travel there with their dead cats and there the cats would be mummified and buried so that they would be close to the Cat Goddess however what we also need to be aware of is that this worst pin of cats didn't necessarily mean Egyptians placed above all other animals we see in the writings of Herodotus that Egyptians revered many animals from crocodiles to hippopotamia from long goose to Hawks all of which went through similar processes at death although he does specifically talk about how Egyptians do go out of their way to save cats from Fighters often considering the cat's lives more than the value of the property they're protecting and this reverence of cats by the Egyptians persisted until the end of the atomic Dynasty in 30 BCE but like many traditional religions we see different regions of a Culture worship similar Gods but with different names and so we see similar Gods to best that and one of these is passed who was revered around the region of Thebes and so many hundreds of miles south of boobs this and this God was sometimes depicted with a cat's head and was also associated with fertility but also prosperity and the fortune and he was worshiped around the New Kingdom Period so from between 1550 BCE to 1070 BCE and so all this represents the cat's rise from a domestic pet to its first appearance in mythology and specifically Egyptian mythology and so how and when do cats appear in other mythologies and the answer to this lies with trade ships on the Nile where mice and rats also found themselves hidden in the trade goods which included grain and so many boats had cats on them as they sailed up and down the Nile and as trade split and boats sell to other kingdoms the domesticated cat became introduced all up and down the Nile before sped in to India and then Asia and so as Egyptians traded with India cats came along and we believe they were starting to be domesticated probably around 4 000 years ago here although this is an educated guess as the first literary sources of evidence that appear to about 1500 BCE now we see big cats within Hindu mythology um they appear as the hanas which I'm like mounts for the gods so we have the goddess Shakti with lions or Tigers we see shiver with the big cats as vannas and these big cats can be seen as representing nobility and strength and these cats aren't just Mouse as when reverence is paid to the god or goddess something called the Puja it is also applied to the for Hannah and we also see in the fourth Avatar of Lord Vishnu Nala simha who is half man half lion and who is still worshiped in some places in India today and we also have in Hinduism the cat-headed god Durga although again her head is often a big cat but she can also be regarded as a guardian of the home and protector of women but in terms of domestic cats then we have to go to Bengal where there is a local deity named Mata and this goddess is the detector of pregnant women and young children and uh for Hannah is the domestic cat and this connection of protection aligns to the Egyptian mythology although cannot currently find any evidence to prove the mythology traveled from Egypt but there's also nothing suggest that it didn't and we also see much like in Egypt that the cats are kept in homes to keep them free of vermin and so are seen as Protectors of the home and treated with respect however the folklore between Egypt and India has within it a strange story that looks at cats in a different way so let me tell you a story traced from malula in Syria after a long journey an oil seller arrived at a village in search of food however as soon as the food was served it was devoured by mice The Villages explained that the village was overrun with mice and begged for the oil sellers help he promised to return with a solution a couple of days later the oil seller returned with a cat and he was paid 2 000 passages for his Services the cat successfully rid the village of mice but then began to catching birds and pigeons as well the villagers became concerned that cat would eventually turn to eating them and decided to take drastic measures the Elder of the village altered everyone to abandon their homes and move in to the fields and before leaving the villagers destroyed their houses cut down trees and set everything on fire in the hope of scaring the kettle away or at least depriving it of food however the cat did not leave and so desperate for a solution the Elder Center boy to fetch the oil Cellar when the oil seller returned and learned what had happened he offered to take the cat back but tell me if the villagers paid him 2 000 pastries in the end they all sell a lifter village with the cat and four thousand pastries in hand while the villagers realized that living with mice wasn't so bad after all now this seems a very odd tale about an animal that is so useful that a story doesn't stop here as cats continued to travel around the world and ended in Asia we see the first evidence of domestic cats in China around 4 000 years ago although the exact date of their appearance in Asia is difficult to determine again because there is a lack of early records in Chinese culture they only date back to about 1500 1600 BCE in the Shang Dynasty and whilst their appearancing mythology and religion is negligible within Chinese folklore cats associated with good luck and prosperity and were kept because of their ability to catch from him but we do have a shared Legend in Chinese and Japanese folklore about the beckoning cat named maniki Nico a cat with a race paw that is believed to bring good luck now these cats are often placed near entrances to homes or shops to try and persuade luck to enter the property and one story of The Legend goes like this as a Todd traveler made his way through the District of Edo in Tokyo he was startled when a cat sitting outside a temple motioned for him to follow intrigued the man followed the cat into the temple and began to explore then suddenly a massive storm rolled in complete with thunder and lightning and heavy rain and the traveler was grateful to have taken shelter in the Temple and so thankful that the cat had beckoned him in but he decided to purchase the temple as his own his family Temple and this Temple would later become known as gotokuji Temple now we see this Legend adapt and grow with the cats having different colors meaning different things and different pores ways to bring different kinds of luck and that is why you may see cats in entrances of Chinese or Japanese restaurants hoping to bring their owners luck it is thought that domestic cats arrived in Greece around 3000 years ago and probably via Egyptian Traders and whilst the Greeks didn't venerate cats like the Egyptians they so found a place in Greek mythology with cats becoming associated with Artemis the goddess of the hunt and the moon as well as a fertility and childbirth and they were also associated with being a protector of young girls and were invoked by mothers in childbirth to protect their daughters and this protection included protecting the purity of the girls and we see this evidence through the hammeric hymns of the 7th Century BCE artemis's association with cats probably derived from their shared characteristics such as being agile Hunters showing activity at night when the moon was out and we see myths such as the sacred cats a few fierces that Artemis was the protector of the city of euphasis and this city had a Temple dedicated to her where a number of sacred cats were kept and they were believed to be servants and symbols of utterus and so it was considered to be an honor to be chosen to look after those cats and if anyone was found to harm them then they would be punished and so if we step back we can see a significant amount of Egyptian influence in Greek mythology and this happened very quickly as it sorts the caps on Egyptian Boats were introduced into Greece at the latest around 1000 BCE and so it may have only taken a few hundred years for them to be introduced and firmly established as part of the mythology of Artemis and from here cat slowly became introduced all across Europe the domestic cat probably didn't arrive in Scandal over until around 2000 years ago so did not have much time to play a significant role in Nordic or Germanic mythology especially when compared to other animals such as Horses or Bears or Wolves but we do see two significant occurrences and they are within the myth of god Loki and where they are seen with Freya and her Chariot but neither of these are what they seem to be at first glance the myth of god Loki has Thor challenged to a number of tasks and one is to lift a cat off the ground and he fails and we find out that the cat was actually the human Gander the world serpent now what is interesting about this is that there is now much academic decisions that this myth was actually created by the Christian author of the president and used as a conversion tool to show the Nordic gods as being available and so this could be considered folklore and only 800 years old or so the other occurrence of cats associated with Freya and her Chariot which is often seen as two gray cats pulling the Chariot but that can be disputed where the cat should be put in place with the gilfigerin of the prose editor the cats are said to be drawn I'll draw The Chariot which doesn't mean they pull it but could have actually been alongside the Chariot directing it with freyas signifying their form of Grace or beauty El Paso is also additional thought that her chair could have actually been pulled by bears but Freya also self-associated with cats and certainly at the end of the 10th Century so you would see Nordic farmers at this time leaving milk in their fields as an offering for the cat in the hope that they would protect their crops and so we see this common continuation of a theme where cats use as a protection of domiciles and to storage of brain from piss but from here with The Disappearance of many religions in favor of Christianity we start seeing cats entering folklore as opposed to mythology and there is a difference which you can learn about by watching this video and so let me tell you about some of the more famous and interesting folk tales on cats the mice have said that the cat kept catching them that's stealthy Hunter and so they decided to buy a bell to place on the cat's collar but once I had the bill no one was brave enough to try and put it on the cat and so the mice gave up and sold it to a goblin the goblin then thought it would make a pleasant flower and so he turned it into the cat's Bellflower and that is how the cats build flowers came to be but there's also a version of this story where the mice manager put a belt on the cat's neck and its tail whilst the cat was asleep but then the cat wake up at her is doing it and kill the main menu mice and the rest of the mice ran away but perhaps the most well-known story is boots which originated in France which tells of how a clever and resourceful cat helps his master win the hand of a princess but within vocal we often see Cats associated with magic as opposed to Fantasy and we have the cat Sith of Scotland which is said to be able to shape-shift into human form and is believed to be the guardian of the dead and not to be outdone there are many stories in Mainland Europe of a worker an evil being that hunts down humans and then we have probably the most well-known black cats of all the witch's cat often depicted around Halloween folklore and we often see witches who can transform themselves into these cats rather than the previous folklore of cats that turn into humans but this transformation of a cat into human is not lost as we also see a motif where a cat acts as a familiar which is a demonic spirit that witches can call up when they need help and so sometimes the cat was also seen as a reincarnated form of previous families what I've shown is that cats are rare in mythology as they are late comers to human culture but when they arrived they became very important to society by protecting food and preventing diseases associated with Vermin and decided the success of human populations as farming grew and so as cats became more accepted into communities and towns and in cities a civilizations grew we can see the cat's importance recognized first in Egypt who first fully domesticated the cat and introduced it into their mythology including a myth such as cats having Nine Lives as well as seeing the cat as a protector of homes and women and Associated it with fertility due to the number and size of lit as a cat would have and some of these Egyptian motifs then migrate along with the cat using trade routes first to India and then to China and eventually to Europe via Greece and then to the rest of the world and we have evidence for this not just through archeology but the amount of myth associated with the cat which reduced the closer we get to present day and it's because of this late arrival especially when considered to other animals that we just don't see much ritualistic Behavior around the cat when compared to these other animals such as the dog and the horse and instead the cat is left in history so in folklore but where there is mythology then the catching is very much as a feminine figure most often represented by goddesses and protecting the home and the attributes of fertility and childbirth properly driven by the size of those cat litters but he's in folklore where the cat develops magical powers and Superstition grew a magical reason could still be perceived today as a cat today really isn't much different to the cat of 10 000 years ago it is still very independent it is still a stealthy Hunter and even the homie catches pests and often goes out at night and every bit for shine a light into your eyes a cat at night he looks somewhat possessed but here we've only really just scrubbed the surface of the folklore as I wanted to concentrate on the mythological side and growth of the cat but if you want to hear more about the folklore then please do let me know in the comments below when you clicking that like button I do read all the comments and we'll take them on board and if there's enough support with can do this and also want to thank my patrons who support this Channel and suggested this topic to talk about and for those who have stayed until the very end then I want to say a special thank you as I hit a hundred thousand subscribers and that is all down to you watching and supporting this channel your likes your comments your questions it's just made this channel develop and grow and I hope I can continue to make videos that keep you watching for many more years in the future and drink much more tea and so thank you for that Milestone incredible history and if you prefer dogs or cats then I can suggest you watch this video and until the next please stay safe and well and this was krakenfold

Channel: Crecganford

Views: 168,117

Keywords: ctas, cat myths, myths about cats, cat mythology, cats magic, egypt cats, cats egypt

Id: dL1hms_dQMk

Length: 30min 0sec (1800 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 21 2023