April 09, 2004
9,500 year old house cats
House cats date back 9,500 years, excavation finds
Dan Vergano
USA Today
Apr. 9, 2004 10:04 AM
It appears that dogs have been chasing cats around the house for much longer than anyone thought.
A cat that may have been buried with its owner at least 9,500 years ago has been uncovered at an archeological site in Cyprus. If the animal was indeed a pet, the discovery, reported Friday in the journal Science, turns back the clock on the origin of the house cat by thousands of years.
Only dogs, domesticated 12,500 years ago, have a longer history as pets.
It had been thought that the ancient Egyptians were the first known cat owners. The Egyptians revered their felines and kept them as pets more than 4,000 years ago.
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Posted by Dienekes at April 9, 2004 06:37 PM | PermaLinkInteresting, but it seems plausible that they lived in some sort of coexistance earlier, from the time there were half or fully sedentary settlements.
First humans found cats probably interesting from the first contact, need them for some sort of varmints when they stored food and could eat them if there was great hunger of course...
Were there rests from cats humans ate in early times or not?
Not that I want to say I would eat them, I liked my cat. :)
Posted by: Chris at April 15, 2004 03:38 PM