This is a really neat story!!
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - What may have been one of the earliest pet cats has been found in a richly furnished tomb in Cyprus, French scientists reported on Thursday.
The 8-month-old kitten appears to have been deliberately buried alongside a human in a Stone Age grave 9,500 years ago, the researchers report this week in the journal Science.
While the finding may not surprise present-day cat lovers, the researchers at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris say it represents the earliest example of what was likely a domesticated cat.
"It is generally accepted that cats were first domesticated in ancient Egypt at the latest by the 20th to 19th century B.C. (3,000 to 4,000 years ago)," the researchers, led by Jean-Denis Vigne, wrote.
But experts suspected that people discovered the unique charm and usefulness of cats long before then.
Vigne's team unearthed a grave site in the Neolithic village of Khirokitia that was filled with polished stone, axes, a pigment called ochre and flint tools. A pit filled with sea shells was nearby.
Just 16 inches (40 cm) from the curled-up human skeleton in the grave was the kitty skeleton.
The cat was not a modern domesticated cat, Felis domesticus, but Felis silvestris, a wildcat significantly larger than house cats. The sex of the animal or its probable owner could not be determined.
"The burial of a complete cat without any signs of butchering reminds us of human burials and emphasizes the animal as an individual," the researchers wrote.
"The joint burial could also imply a strong association between two individuals, a human and a cat. In addition, the young cat might have been killed in order to be buried at the same time as the human."
Figurines found across the Middle East suggest that people have liked cats for a long time. The researchers note that Cyprus does not appear to have had a natural population of cats and the island is far enough away from the mainland to suggest that any cats there were brought deliberately.
"In lieu of finding a bell around its neck, this is about as solid evidence as one can have that cats held a special place in the lives and afterlives of residents of this site," Melinda Zeder of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, told Science.
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