also quite a number of confessions from witches claiming they became cats, but it’s nearly certain that most of these were obtained under torture. One woman in England was hanged because a neighbor saw a cat jump up onto her windowsill, and was convinced it was the devil.
Reading the history of cats in Europe can give you nightmares. As victims of the witch hysteria, cats were put on trial and convicted, whipped, burned, boiled, drowned, and walled-in alive. They had gone from being creatures who were worshipped as gods to creatures that, because they were linked with the Goddess, were feared and destroyed.
That Old Black Magic
D uring this period, there were people who were actually practicing black magic, and they, too, killed and tormented cats and used feline body parts in their spells, giving some truth to the church’s claims. These devotees of the black arts believed that the cat’s ability to see spirits was contained in some part of their body—usually the eyes or skin—and that ability could be transferred to a human if the human ate the body part or wore it as a talisman. Sometimes, in an effort to gain this “second sight,” the ashes of burnt cats were ground into an ointment and applied to the eyes, or the cats were simply offered as sacrifices to the gods of darkness. Even as recently as 1923, the British occultist Aleister Crowley, a sadist who hated cats, was believed to have transfixed a cat through magic and then sacrificed it in a ritual to cure his hepatitis.
I know. This all sounds gross beyond belief, but it’s not that different from what’s still going on in Asia. One reason that tigers are currently endangered is that poachers are killing them in order to sell their body parts for potions that are supposed to do everything from strengthening bones to curing arthritis to working as an aphrodisiac.
What finally put an end to the persecution of cats in the West—and it took centuries—was the realization that cats were essential in stopping the waves of bubonic plague that were devastating Europe. It wasn’t understood then that rats and mice carried fleas, which spread the plague. Gradually, though, people began to notice that there weren’t as many deaths in households with cats, and they finally made the rat-flea-disease connection. After that, cats were considered invaluable in the fight against the plague. Even the church had to acknowledge this and finally put an end to burning them.
Yet even throughout these times when cats were so widely feared, beliefs in cats as beneficent creatures with mystical powers that allowed them to predict the future or bring good luck remained. Throughout the British Isles, a cat sneezing or washing itself behind its ears with a wet forepaw was a sign of rain; a cat sitting with its back to the fire, a sign of coming frost. It was also said that a black cat would bring a maiden her lover, and that a cat sneezing on a wedding day was a good omen for the bride. Traces of beliefs in magical “helper” cats can still be found in the European fairy tales. Check out Charles Perrault’s “Puss in Boots” or Madame d’Aulnoy’s “Queen Cat” (also known as “White Cat”) in which courtly, elegant cats are not only lucky but save the people they love from misfortune. In the South of France, people believed in Matagot, or “magician” cats that would bring prosperity into a house where they were loved and wellcared for (though according to one French fairy tale, “The Black Cat,” all cats are magicians). Some stories claim that the Matagot were enemies of the demonic fairy cats, the Marcaou, but more typical are good-luck stories, like the popular tale of “Dick Whittington and His Cat.”
MAGICAL CATS IN OTHER CULTURES
“Who can believe that there is no soul behind those luminous eyes?”
—Theophile Gautier
It wasn’t only the medieval Europeans who believed that cats were magical. In Islamic lore, the djinn were supernatural creatures
Reading the history of cats in Europe can give you nightmares. As victims of the witch hysteria, cats were put on trial and convicted, whipped, burned, boiled, drowned, and walled-in alive. They had gone from being creatures who were worshipped as gods to creatures that, because they were linked with the Goddess, were feared and destroyed.
That Old Black Magic
D uring this period, there were people who were actually practicing black magic, and they, too, killed and tormented cats and used feline body parts in their spells, giving some truth to the church’s claims. These devotees of the black arts believed that the cat’s ability to see spirits was contained in some part of their body—usually the eyes or skin—and that ability could be transferred to a human if the human ate the body part or wore it as a talisman. Sometimes, in an effort to gain this “second sight,” the ashes of burnt cats were ground into an ointment and applied to the eyes, or the cats were simply offered as sacrifices to the gods of darkness. Even as recently as 1923, the British occultist Aleister Crowley, a sadist who hated cats, was believed to have transfixed a cat through magic and then sacrificed it in a ritual to cure his hepatitis.
I know. This all sounds gross beyond belief, but it’s not that different from what’s still going on in Asia. One reason that tigers are currently endangered is that poachers are killing them in order to sell their body parts for potions that are supposed to do everything from strengthening bones to curing arthritis to working as an aphrodisiac.
What finally put an end to the persecution of cats in the West—and it took centuries—was the realization that cats were essential in stopping the waves of bubonic plague that were devastating Europe. It wasn’t understood then that rats and mice carried fleas, which spread the plague. Gradually, though, people began to notice that there weren’t as many deaths in households with cats, and they finally made the rat-flea-disease connection. After that, cats were considered invaluable in the fight against the plague. Even the church had to acknowledge this and finally put an end to burning them.
Yet even throughout these times when cats were so widely feared, beliefs in cats as beneficent creatures with mystical powers that allowed them to predict the future or bring good luck remained. Throughout the British Isles, a cat sneezing or washing itself behind its ears with a wet forepaw was a sign of rain; a cat sitting with its back to the fire, a sign of coming frost. It was also said that a black cat would bring a maiden her lover, and that a cat sneezing on a wedding day was a good omen for the bride. Traces of beliefs in magical “helper” cats can still be found in the European fairy tales. Check out Charles Perrault’s “Puss in Boots” or Madame d’Aulnoy’s “Queen Cat” (also known as “White Cat”) in which courtly, elegant cats are not only lucky but save the people they love from misfortune. In the South of France, people believed in Matagot, or “magician” cats that would bring prosperity into a house where they were loved and wellcared for (though according to one French fairy tale, “The Black Cat,” all cats are magicians). Some stories claim that the Matagot were enemies of the demonic fairy cats, the Marcaou, but more typical are good-luck stories, like the popular tale of “Dick Whittington and His Cat.”
MAGICAL CATS IN OTHER CULTURES
“Who can believe that there is no soul behind those luminous eyes?”
—Theophile Gautier
It wasn’t only the medieval Europeans who believed that cats were magical. In Islamic lore, the djinn were supernatural creatures
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