LUDMILA LURKIN represents the project:             CATS - such, what they can be - such, what they are
	ages ago The cats history goes back to even before Egyptian times. But the Egyptians were the first documented cat worshipers. This worship of cats became well known outside Egypt and was seen as rather ridiculous. The cats history was even involved in a famous battle between the Egyptians and the Persians in 525 B.C. The story is told that the Persian commander stationed cats in his frontline. The Egyptians refused to attack for fear of harming the animals and so lost the battle against the Persians. The story may be unlikely, but it makes a point about how the Egyptians worshiped and loved the cat. Egyptian art also featured this animal in a humorous vein in much the same way as modern greeting cards. Scraps of papyrus and limestone found at ancient Egyptian sites include cartoon style drawings of cats in various unlikely roles. The cats history can also be traced back to ancient Greek times. The Greeks identified cats with women, and in particular with the goddess Venus as Venus was the goddess of farming as well as fertility, the cats history as represented by Greek art pales in comparison to the amount of cats that are noted in a Egyptian art. The cats history in Egyptian art sometime shows the feline in domestic settings. Example: sitting at the feet of the owner's chair or on a woman's lap or also in the hunting fields, where they were used to flush out to wildfowl for the hunters. In the mid-1700s the cats place in society was enhanced by a public health disaster. A sinister visitor began to spread across Europe from Central Asia. It was the Brown rat that carried the Black plague. The plague broke out in Germany and in France by the mid-1700s at this time the cities of Europe and North America were growing at an alarming rate. Building did not keep pace with population growth and the cities became overcrowded and disease ridden and filthy. This filth would attract the cunning brown and black rats. Once again, the cats history of being an extremely efficient hunter helped the human population check the rat population. Famous cat quote "Thousands of years ago, cats were worshipped as gods. Cats have never forgotten this." Anonymous
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