Cats in the middle ages

[humphreyclarke]

Hi there

Does anyone know anything about these reports of the persecution of cats during the middle ages?. e.g

With increasing opposition and the passage of time, the fertility cults degenerated and pagan deities came to be regarded as devils and demons. Pagan cults were banned in the 4th Century. Pope Gregory IX denounced the black cat as diabolical in his 1233 Papal Bull 'Vox in Rama' and this launched the extermination of many cats. In the late Middle Ages, thousands of cats were burned alive in the cause of searching out the devil. Many of the European Fire Festivals and Wicker traditions involved the sacrifice or burning of cats. Women who owned cats were accused of being witches, using their cat's as 'familiars' to do evil to others. The glittering eyes, fecundity and lustful mating behaviour of the cat became signs of ungodliness rather than symbols of divinity. By the Medieval period, cats in Christendom had lost most vestiges of divine status although they were still believed to have magic powers. The cat was therefore a symbol of luck to some and an instrument of evil to others.

The story going round on the internet is that the church ordered the killing of cats and that this helped contribute to the Black Death.

E.G

www.cats.com/article/cattales/folklore/the-black-plague-revenge-of-the-cats/

This seems a bit of an odd specualtion because the Black Death was virulent in China and the Middle East where there don't appear to have been many stigmas against cats.

There doesn't seem to be much scholarship on this. Anyone come across anything?.

[James Hannam]

Humphrey,

I remember this coming up on Internet Infidels many many years ago. The title article in Robert Darnston's The Great Cat Massacre might be worth a look as I remember it had a bit about cat folklore.

Best wishes

James

[rfmoo]

Dear Humphrey,

A major source of this theme has to be a book called Classical Cats,
written by an old graduate school friend of mine, Donald Engels. Don has done some very fine work in Classics: his book on the logistics of Alexander the Great's campaigns is the gold standard on the subject. However, I am not so sure on the soundness of his work on cats, although it had good reviews. He does know how to research, of course, so he has no doubt collected documentation on the subject of cats in Christian Europe.

Don submitted what was no doubt an early version of this work for a scholarly anthology that a colleague and I were editing. The thesis was that the ignorant and irrational Christians of the middle ages superstitiously killed off cats, by contrast with rational Jews and ancient pagans. This is why, according to him, the Black Death hit Europe so hard, since cats killed the rats that carry the fleas that spread the disease. My colleague and I rejected the article because it showed a bias against Christianity that was almost pathological and because otherwise the documentation and reasoning were not satisfactory (we did consult historians). I am happy to say that we did publish a substitute paper of his on the ancient economy that I still think sound.

When his book on cats (which I did not read) came out, I did a little quick checking on the demographics of the Black Plague. It was devastating everywhere it spread, including in the middle east and China where as far as I can tell cats were kept.

I still consider Don a good friend, and some of his work is brilliant, but I would handle his conclusions on Christians and cats with tongs. To twist a saying by Ronald Reagan, distrust and make very sure you verify.

Best,

Richard Moorton

[humphreyclarke]

Richard, thankyou for that insight.

How very interesting

I did come across that paticular book using 'google books' and I read the relevant sections on the middle ages. I wasn't very impressed because when I checked the sources he referenced for certain things (again, using google books), they didn't appear to corroborate the statements he made; (I did notice Dickinson White in there as a footnote!). Cats of course are also capable of spreading plague as they carry fleas and the plague appears to have spread in regions without folk biases against cats. There is also the issue of how massacres of cats could have been conducted during the black death if they had been driven almost to extinction in the decades previously.

[humphreyclarke]

Hmmm, I just noticed, every time I type D.I.C.K, as in D.I.C.K Dawkins, or Andrew D.I.C.K.inson White, the forum changes it to 'thingy'. How very Victorian!.

[unkleE]

Dec 19, 2008 17:37:12 GMT humphreyclarke said:

Hmmm, I just noticed, every time I type D.I.C.K, as in D.I.C.K Dawkins, or Andrew D.I.C.K.inson White, the forum changes it to 'thingy'. How very Victorian!.

Lol!! And a while back it changed my "s.n.i.g.g.e.r.s" to "sblack persons"!

And also, the banner ad this morning was for a Muslim dating service. Not sure that there are many Muslims reading this forum and looking for a partner, and I doubt they had mixed religion relationships in mind, but if James makes money out of it to pay the bills .......

I love this as a serious forum, but sometimes the trivial is too good to let go by without comment! : )

[James Hannam]

I think I've figured the word changes and will see if I can do anything about it.

Zameel and I have been talking about Islamic science which explains the ads. They come with the board and keep it free. When the spammers have done their stuff we briefly get Chinese ads because that's the language the spammers spam in.

Best wishes

James

[James Hannam]

OK. The censored words are fixed, but something may have gone awry...

J

[unkleE]

All this is off topic, but certainly amusing.

I just noticed today that in one of my old posts, the (I would have thought) inoffensive word D.a.w.k.i.n.s was changed to "the Plonker". This must be James' evil and perverted sense of humour! Any chance of hacking into D.a.w.k.i.n.s.n.e.t and making the changes in its spell-checker???

[bjorn]

To reopen this thread, which is impossible to view as more than an urban myth - www.splendoroftruth.com/curtjester/archives/2007/08/church-responsi.php

A standard angle from www.libraryindex.com/pages/2149/History-Human-Animal-Interaction-MEDIEVAL-PERIOD.html:

"Though cats had always behaved in this manner, to the superstitious minds of the Middle Ages, cats were practicing supernatural powers and witchcraft. Most accused witches were older peasant women who lived alone, often keeping cats as pets for companionship. This guilt by association meant that roughly a million cats were burned at the stake, along with their owners, on suspicion of being witches".

To state the obvious, as no witches were burnt in the Middle Ages, this means that no cats were burnt either.

And another angle again, from ezinearticles.com/?Cats,-People,-and-the-Black-Plague:-Those-Who-Kept-Cats-Survived&id=161249

"It took the authorities some time to figure out the cause of the problem. At one point they tested the theory that the disease was being spread by dogs and cats; thus the mayor of London ordered the execution of all such pets. Despite the extermination of millions of companion animals, however, the plague did not abate but actually accelerated, for, of course, the elimination of all cats was soon followed by an explosion of the rat population.

Eventually it became evident that people who had kept cats, in violation of the law, fared better; for the cats, according to their nature, killed the rats that carried the fleas that really carried the plague. People slowly began to deduce the rat-flea-disease connection. When the truth finally came to light, cats were quickly elevated to hero status, and soon became protected by law.”

So in reality it was all due to science. The authorities made a testable hypothesis, which then was falsfied.

From this we learn again how dangerous science is. It poisons everything.