The complex origin story of domestic cats
22 comments
·April 22, 2025lenerdenator
OneDeuxTriSeiGo
And of course being able to eliminate pest populations responsible for disease transmission, food spoilage, equipment/infrastructure damage, and other various harms has earned cats that seat in the pantheons of cultures around the globe.
lenerdenator
And if we're being honest, the whole soft tummies thing and purring probably helped too.
... this thread needs pictures.
sshine
> eliminate ... equipment/infrastructure damage
And cause it.
delichon
Domestic cats are a contradiction in terms. They are small wild cats who have partially domesticated hairless apes, and still have a lot of work to do.
ghaff
Domestic cats are arguably the most successful mammalian carnivores anywhere.
EasyMarion
they hunted us for food once, figured out we’d feed them instead, and never looked back. probably the only species that domesticated us.
lenerdenator
I guess I'm trying to get the message of the article.
It's more of an origin story of the current lineage of domestic cats in Europe, no? It sounds like ancient Europeans would have had wildcats and older waves of domesticated felines that were mostly supplanted by the current lineage.
dboreham
Although not mentioned in the article, I've heard that Egyptians developed a thing for orange cats (supposedly they look like the sun) and embarked on an intensive breeding program to make them for temple uses. Subsequently Vikings became intrigued by these orange cats on the basis they are easy to see on the deck of a ship (iron age hi-viz vests), and thereby spread them around everywhere (because Vikings).
ethan_smith
The orange cat coloration (technically "red" or "ginger") is actually due to a sex-linked gene on the X chromosome, not deliberate Egyptian breeding programs. Archaeological evidence doesn't support ancient Egyptian preference for orange cats - their art depicts cats of various colors. Viking-era cat remains show diverse coat colors emerged naturally through genetic drift rather than intentional selection. The spread of orange cats likely occurred through natural genetic distribution alongside human migration patterns.
ChrisMarshallNY
From my understanding, orange cats are almost exclusively male.
They also have one shared brain cell.
Source: My family is owned by a marmalade tom.
toast0
The interwebs say cats have XY sex determination, and that the orange color gene is on the X chromosome and is recessive. So a male cat with an orange X will be orange, but a female cat needs both X's to be orange to be orange (a female cat with one orange X and one non-orange X will likely show as tortoise shell or calico). Assuming equal probability (P) of each X chromosome being orange so we have a chance at modelling, the males will have P chance of being orange, and females would have P * P chance. Assuming cats have evenly distributed sex,
If P is 90%, 90% of males are orange, and 81% of females are orange; and 47% of orange cats are female. If P is 10%, 10% of males are orange, 1% of females are orange, and ~ 91% of orange cats are male, ~ 9% are female.
ChrisMarshallNY
There was a discussion, here, some time ago, about how the orange gene was isolated.
shagie
> orange cats are almost exclusively male
This is also equally true for black cats as the genetics works the same for them too.
However, it's more that "female cats can be tortoiseshell" and thus the ratios will get somewhere around a 2:1 ratio of male orange cats to female orange cats.
Assume that you've got 50% tortie females, 25% orange female, and 25% black female... and 50% orange male and 50% black male. You can run Montecarlo simulations on that but it will always be the case that orange (and black) cats are predominantly male because of the smaller number of options.
There's also the increased visibility of the "trouble puffs" on a male orange cat (compared to black male) and so conformation bias of "yep, that's an orange male cat."
trollied
> They also have one shared brain cell.
You will appreciate:
mapt
You've got probably thousands of years between these two events, which undoubtedly contains a lot of feline history.
jmyeet
I always figured that the cat's ability to eliminate vermin, particularly on ships, propelled their domestication and spread. This was simply too useful to early humans.
I'm reminded of the Russian silver fox domestication experiment [1]. What's interesting about that is how quickly the species adapts characteristics making them more desirable for humans.
[1]: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/russian-foxes-tameness-d...
rufus_foreman
Vermin on ships weren't all bad. They prevented scurvy if you didn't overcook them.
"Taken together, these studies significantly alter our understanding of one of humanity's most familiar companions. Rather than silently trailing behind early farmers, slinking ever closer to human activity and community, cats likely moved into Europe in multiple waves post-domestication from North Africa, propelled by human cultural practices, trade networks, and religious reverence."
Being treated like a god will get you everywhere.