We know that modern house cats descend from a species of wildcat (Felis lybica) native to Africa and the Middle East, which we call the African wildcat. The consensus seems to be that these cats were first domesticated in the Middle East during Neolithic times, but we all know they became popular with the ancient Egyptians (in fact, Egypt is another hypothesized location for the cat's domestication). Does anyone know if pre-colonial Africans outside of Egypt also kept pet cats? I haven't been able to find any information answering that specific question yet.
quote: Because of its ubiquity in later Dynastic Egyptian art and mortuary practices, the domestic cat Felis catus was long considered to have been domesticated in Egypt from F. silvestris libyca (e.g. Malek 1997). Linseele et al. (2007) reported on probable taming of a cat found buried in a Predynastic cemetery at Hierakonpolis, dated to c. 3700 BC, originally attributing this to Felis silvestris. The specimen displays healed fractures of the left humerus and right femur, reflecting a period of protection after the breaks of these bones, which the authors interpret as evidence for taming, which finding still stands, despite their later re-identification of the species as F. chaus, which is not ancestral to domestic cats (Linseele et al. 2008).
Archaeological and genetic evidence implies a geographically broader and substantially older origin for domestication of the wild cat. Scattered finds of cat bones on Cyprus in the PPNB reflect human introduction of non-native Felis silvestris into the island’s ecosystem. A 7500 BC joint burial of a human and a juvenile cat in the Neolithic village of Shillourokambos has been interpreted by Vigne et al. (2004) as evidence for taming of the species there. Linseele et al. (2007) question whether the evidence supports the inference of taming in the latter case. Whether other cats recovered from similar Predynastic contexts are domestic awaits better documentation of context and ancient DNA analysis.
A large-scale mtDNA analyses of many cat species on three continents (O’Brien et al. 2008) supports the idea that cats were domesticated throughout a broad range of Southwest Asia. All domestic cats bear Clade IV mtDNA haplotypes of the F. silvestris libyca subspecies, the geographic range of which includes Africa and Southwest Asia. O’Brien et al. (2008, p. 274) state that, ‘a STRUCTURE-based population genetic analysis identified a discrete population of wildcats from the Near East (Israel, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia…) that probably reflects the ancestral founder population for the world’s domestic cats.’ The study found that extant domestic cats comprise at least five mtDNA lineages, each of considerably greater antiquity (>100,000 years) than the hypothesized inception of domestication, suggesting multiple domestication events across the species’ geographic range. Since wild cats were probably attracted to many settlements where rodents and small birds parasitized on stored grains on multiple occasions, several taming and domestication processes are possible. Driscoll et al. (2009) argue that cats may have to some extent self-domesticated, as individuals able to tolerate proximity to people and their activities exploited the pest-rich niche of human settlements, where they found mates among conspecifics with similar tolerances.
The above passage suggests that African wildcats may have been domesticated on several separate occasions throughout their range within the last 100,000 years. Given that we all know modern humans emerged in Africa where these cats were native, it makes me wonder whether humans were keeping cats longer than they have been keeping dogs or other pets?
Posted by Djehuti (Member # 6698) on :
^ Excellent question. I hypothesize that cats played a major role in the domestication process of plants, particularly grains since grain storage attracts rodents. Even before grains were domesticated humans were gathering wild grasses for food and were storing their supplies that were prone to rodent attacks.
What's more is that while all the sources seem to correlate the spread of cat domestication with the spread of Neolithic culture which is posited as 'Near Eastern' or 'Middle Eastern', it still remains that the source species of cat Felis silvestris lybica an African species which begs the question of African human input in the Neolithic i.e. 'Basal Eurasian'.
Posted by Tyrannohotep (Member # 3735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Djehuti: ^ Excellent question. I hypothesize that cats played a major role in the domestication process of plants, particularly grains since grain storage attracts rodents. Even before grains were domesticated humans were gathering wild grasses for food and were storing their supplies that were prone to rodent attacks.
What's more is that while all the sources seem to correlate the spread of cat domestication with the spread of Neolithic culture which is posited as 'Near Eastern' or 'Middle Eastern', it still remains that the source species of cat Felis silvestris lybica an African species which begs the question of African human input in the Neolithic i.e. 'Basal Eurasian'.
I think African wildcats do range into Arabia and the Levant though. Source Posted by Djehuti (Member # 6698) on :
^ Indeed they do range into Southwest Asia but interestingly enough the highlighted areas of the map above are the same areas where African human ancestry is detected.
Posted by Archeopteryx (Member # 23193) on :
Some more about ancient Cats
quote: Abstract Cat domestication likely initiated as a symbiotic relationship between wildcats (Felis silvestris subspecies) and the peoples of developing agrarian societies in the Fertile Crescent. As humans transitioned from hunter-gatherers to farmers ~12,000 years ago, bold wildcats likely capitalized on increased prey density (i.e., rodents). Humans benefited from the cats’ predation on these vermin. To refine the site(s) of cat domestication, over 1000 random-bred cats of primarily Eurasian descent were genotyped for single-nucleotide variants and short tandem repeats. The overall cat population structure suggested a single worldwide population with significant isolation by the distance of peripheral subpopulations. The cat population heterozygosity decreased as genetic distance from the proposed cat progenitor’s (F.s. lybica) natural habitat increased. Domestic cat origins are focused in the eastern Mediterranean Basin, spreading to nearby islands, and southernly via the Levantine coast into the Nile Valley. Cat population diversity supports the migration patterns of humans and other symbiotic species.
^ Over the past several years it seems all the studies seem to be making the case for cat domestication being associated with Levantine first farmers i.e. Natufians.
It seems to make sense. If the Natufians were themselves African, the figs they brought with them are African, so it shouldn't be surprised that the cats they brought (Felis lybica) is also African.
Posted by Archeopteryx (Member # 23193) on :
To connect to the question in the OP: According to the study I posted it seems like todays cats in the mainland of Kenya have genetic signatures similar to Western European cats, while cats from the eastern coastal Kenyan islands have signatures similar to cats from the Arabian sea. The cats on Madagascar seems linked to the cats from the Arabian Sea and the coastal islands of Kenya (and not to cats from France).
So one can still ask which other areas in Africa had domesticated cats in precolonial times.
In Europe domesticated cats seems to have spread earlier than hitherto been assumed.
Simplified routes for the early expansion of Felis silvestris lybica across Europe (based on our direct dating of the earliest Felis bones from Poland and Serbia in combination with data from Vigne et al. Reference Vigne2004; Driscoll et al. Reference Driscoll2007; Faure & Kitchener Reference Faure and Kitchener2009; Krajcarz et al. Reference Krajcarz2016, Reference Krajcarz2020; Ottoni et al. Reference Ottoni2017; Baca et al. Reference Baca2018). Age ranges are radiocarbon ages in years BC/AD produced using OxCal v.4.4 (at 95.4% probability), calibrated using the IntCal20 calibration curve (Bronk Ramsey Reference Bronk Ramsey2009; Reimer et al. Reference Reimer2020) (figure by M.T. Krajcarz, using source data from The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species
