A recent study revealed that adopting cats as a pet dates back to 12,000 years, in the Fertile Crescent region in the Mediterranean basin, specifically near Iraq today.
According to the study prepared by researchers from the University of Missouri, USA, cats were taken as pets by farmers, with the transition of civilizations from hunting to agriculture between 12 thousand and 8 thousand years ago, before the ancient Egyptians, who were believed to be the first to take them as pets, reports a local Arabic daily.
The researchers said that “humans first received domestic animals in the Fertile Crescent region, specifically in the regions of the Middle East surrounding the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, to use them in controlling pests in their new settlements,” according to the British newspaper, “Daily Mail”.
The new study found that “the important shift in lifestyle for humans was the catalyst that sparked the first use of cats as pets in the world, but the link between them was established, once humans began traveling around the world and brought with them new feline friends.”
“Unlike horses and cattle, whose domestication is due to different events, cats seem to be the only animals that are domesticated through a single event and location,” according to the study.
The results showed that the origins of “domestic cats” came in the eastern Mediterranean basin, then spread to neighboring islands and traveled south through the coast of the Levant to the Nile Valley.
According to the study published in the journal Nature, this movement of cats follows the same migration pattern of ancient humans. Once humans began spreading out of the Fertile Crescent, cats began making their way around the world.
Cats migrated to Europe and east from the Fertile Crescent, along with agricultural development and trade. From Europe, the cats boarded boats heading to the Americas, according to Sky News.
