The Tabbitarium
The Medieval Tabby
Good Countrymen, Gentry and Tabby Mates. Your attention I beg and I pray. For today,
true as an arrow flies, did the Old Man,
ye old history channel, watcheth. And in
the watched didest we learn something, one and all.
The History channel,
for those who are not regular viewers, is a cornucopia of the kind
of films your substitute teacher used to show in grade school on the days your regular
teacher had the flu. Skinny and I used to hang in the alley behind the elementary
school and watch em and scarf up the pieces of boloney the kids threw out the window to
us. So today, the story was called "Dark Ages: The Worst Jobs In History" and it's all
about the stuff you don't think of when Robin Hood and King Arthur come to mind.
The Worst Jobs in History, hosted by Tony Robinson, is an examination of activities
the peasants in the Middle Ages. Jobs like Leech Collector and Manure plasterer. Oh
mates! If a tabby needed a resume, how I would love to have urine boiler on it!
This thought leads naturally to what life must have been like for the cat in medieval
times. When one asks this question, there is really only one authority I turn to;
Bartholomaeus Anglicus and his encyclopedia "De proprietatibus rerum"
(roughly "On the nature of things") which he published in the mid 1200's. In this work
he tells us that:
"He is a full lecherous beast in youth, swift, pliant, and merry,
and leapeth and reseth on everything that is to fore him: and is
led by a straw, and playeth therewith: and is a right heavy beast
in age and full sleepy, and lieth slyly in wait for mice: and is
aware where they be more by smell than by sight, and hunteth and
resteth on them in privy places: and when he taketh a mouse, he playeth
therewith, and eateth him after the play."
The "Encyclopedia Britannica", as more recent publication, tells us a more colorful story
about tabbies:
"Cats were not nearly so well-regarded in Europe during the Middle Ages. They became objects
of superstitions and were associated with evil. The cat was believed to be endowed with powers
of black magic—an associate of witches and perhaps the embodiment of the devil. Persons who
kept cats were suspected of wickedness and were often put to death along with their cats."
In the 9th century, an Irish monk declares his love for his cat with poetry on this wonderful
site in honor of Buster, a fallen Comrade.
I and Pangur Ban my cat, 'Tis a like task we are at,
Hunting mice is his delight, Hunting words I sit all night
'Tis a merry thing to see, At our tasks how glad are we
When at home we sit and find, Entertainment to our mind.
'Gainst the wall he sets his eye, Full and fierce and sharp and sly,
'Gainst the wall of knowledge I, All my little wisdom try.
So in peace our task we ply: Pangur Ban my cat and I
In our arts and in our bliss, I have mine and he has his.
And there we have it. Sometimes the humans see us as Gods, and sometimes they see us as the Devils familiars. No matter which day it is, however, we are what we are, Cats!
