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bringing their domestic cats with them, some of the animals mated with the stockier northern Wild Cats and produced heavier, more robust offspring. Today's modern cats reflect this, some being big and sturdy, like many of the tabbies, while others are more elongated and angular, like the various Siamese breeds. It is likely that these Siamese animals and the other more slender breeds are closer to the Egyptian original, their domestic ancestors having been dispersed throughout the world without any contact with the heavy-set northern Wild Cats.
    Although opinions have differed, it now seems highly improbable that any other species of wild feline was involved in the history of modern domestic cats. We do know that a second, bigger cat, Fehs chaus, the Jungle Cat, was popular with the ancient Egyptians, but it appears to have dropped out of the running very early on. We can, however, be certain that it was originally a serious contender for the domestication stakes, because examination of mummified cats has revealed that some of them possessed the much larger Jungle Cat skulls.
    But although the Jungle Cat is one of the more friendly cats in captivity, it is huge in comparison with even the heftiest of modern domestic animals and it is therefore unlikely that it played a part in the later domestication story.
    This is not the place to give details of the modern cat breeds, but a brief history of their introduction will help to give some idea of the way the modern cat 'fancy' has become established:
    The oldest breeds involved are the various Shorthaired Cats, descendants of the animals spread across Europe by the Romans. There is then a long gap until the sixteenth century, when ships from the Orient arrived at the Isle of Man carrying a strange tail-less cat the famous Manx.
    Because of its curiously mutilated appearance, this breed has never been widely popular, though it still has its devotees. At about the same time the first of the Longhaired Cats, the beautiful Angora, was brought into Europe from its Turkish homelands. Later, in the mid-nineteenth century, it was to be largely eclipsed by the even more spectacular Persian Cat from Asia Minor, with its enormously thick, luxuriant coat of fur.
    Then, in the late nineteenth century, in complete contrast, the angular, elongated Siamese arrived from the Far East. With its unique personality – far more extrovert than other cats – it appealed to a quite different type of cat-owner. Whereas the Persian was the perfect, rounded, fluffy child substitute with a rather infantile, flattened face, the Siamese was a much more active companion.
    At about the same time as the appearance of the Siamese, the elegant Russian Blue was imported from Russia and the tawny, wild-looking Abyssinian from what is now Ethiopia.
    In the present century, the dusky Burmese was taken to the United States in the 1930's and from there to Europe. In the 1960's several unusual additions appeared as sudden mutations: the bizarre Sphynx, a naked cat from Canada; the crinkly-haired Rex from Devon and Cornwall; and the flattened-eared Fold Cat from Scotland. In the 1970's the Japanese Bobtail Cat, with its curious little stump making it look like a semiManx Cat, was imported into the United States; the crinkly Wire-haired Cat was developed from a mutation in America; and the diminutive DrainCat (so called because drains were a good place to hide in cat-scorning Singapore) appeared on the American scene, rejoicing in the exotic name of Singapura.
    Finally there was the extraordinary Ragdoll Cat, with the strangest temperament of any feline. If picked up, it hangs limply like a rag doll. It is so placid that it gives the impression of being permanently drugged. Nothing seems to worry it. More of a hippie-cat than a hip-cat, it seems only appropriate that it was first bred in California.
    This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it gives some idea of the range of cats available to the pedigree enthusiast.