26. As it Turns Out, Humans Did Not Domesticate Cats. Cats Domesticated Themselves
We now know that wild cats lived alongside humans for thousands of years before they were domesticated. DNA analysis shows that in those millennia of coexistence before domestication, the wild cats’ genes hardly changed. There were only a few minor and cosmetic alterations in their coats, to produce the dots and stripes of the tabby cat. Also, unlike other domesticated animals, cat domestication did not come about because of deliberate human efforts. Instead, the process was initiated and driven by the cats themselves. Attracted by the relative abundance of rodents in and around human agricultural communities, they deliberately sought out those communities and the delicious rodents therein.
It was only after thousands of years in which wild cats lived alongside humans and preyed upon the rodents that infest our crops that they changed. Eventually, there was enough genetic variation between the wild cats that lived amongst us and those still out in the wild, that we ended up with the common tabby. We did not deliberately bring that about, but simply tolerated and welcomed those wild cats as they preyed on the rodents that stole our grains. So in that sense, humans did not domesticate cats. Instead, cats domesticated themselves.
