Through what channels does information come to us, people? Smell, touch, hearing, sight … Do we use only these channels, and are there any others? And the domestic animals around us, for example, the same cats … Are they as simple as it seems to us at first glance?
While you live - run, play
Bushy tail.
You know cats go to heaven
Through the black holes of stars
Snow will fill the sky along the edge -
From here until the morning.
You yourself will find the path, my friend, When the time is right
Nika Batchen. "A song for a little friend."
Information field of people and animals. How often in our VO people start arguing about the generation of the Unified State Exam, they are surprised that children do not read books, although the question always arises: are they not their children? Why is it they, "the most reading citizens of the most reading country in the world", have not encouraged them to read? In Dagestan, they say: "There are no good youth, where there were no good old people." This, by the way, is just about our "critics", although people in the same Ancient Egypt wrote such things many millennia ago. But there is a certain mitigating circumstance here. Although psychology and pedagogy are taught in our pedagogical universities in all forms, we do not know very much about the work of our brain. We write that culture is not passed on to children at birth, that the child's brain is a "tabula race" - a "blank slate". But … there are many examples when children copy the behavior of their parents, with whom they have never lived together. And the cats? Yes, yes, those same familiar domestic cats … I have been living with them since childhood and noticed that their behavior has changed a lot over time. Moreover, even in those cats that practically do not communicate with their fellow tribesmen at all. Or do they still communicate, but in such a way that we do not notice it.
By the way, the same cats have lived next to people for thousands of years and are quite accessible for study. Do we know them? We don’t know, just as we don’t know ourselves. But maybe just today some moments associated with the same cats and other animals will help us, people, to solve the problems of the same upbringing of our children, even if not even now, but in the future? In the meantime, as a "preface", let's get acquainted with the fascinating story of the feline genus, which, by the way, many readers of VO asked me to tell about. How does this relate to the subject of HE? Yes, the most direct … although, perhaps, not quite direct.
Legend says that when the very first kingdoms-states were just emerging on the lands of Egypt, a boat floated along the Nile River, and there were powerful people in it who managed to escape during a catastrophe that destroyed a great and ancient unknown civilization. And there was a small cat among them. And when the boat swam along the coast, overgrown with papyrus and palm trees, the cat jumped to the ground and wished to stay here forever. A beautiful goddess immediately descended to the cat from the sky (probably it was Bast herself - a goddess with a cat's head) and promised her honor and patronage in this new homeland of hers, but only on condition that the cat would take the people living here under its protection (!) who will need her help.
Then the goddess said that both the cat and her offspring would not be in danger here, that for her these were blessed lands, but if she left them, then she would be in trouble!
Judging by what happened next, the cat goddess liked the offer, and she stayed in Egypt. Moreover, exactly where her cat's paw set foot on the land of Egypt, people built the large city of Bubastis, in the middle of which there was a beautiful temple dedicated to the cat goddess Bast and all her descendants.
For several millennia, there was no better life for cats than life in ancient Egypt. Cats reigned supreme in the minds and even more so in the homes of the Egyptians. Indeed, in addition to the most cat-headed goddess Bast, several Egyptian gods, including the supreme god of the Sun Ra, provided their protection to cats at once. In every, even the poorest house for graceful hunting cats, the best food was always ready, and the death of a cat was a real tragedy for the Egyptians. Each Egyptian mourned the deceased cat even more than his deceased relative, shaved off his eyebrows as a sign of grief, arranged a truly royal funeral for her, embalmed her carcass and took her to the city of Bubastis, where there was a vast cemetery specially arranged for cats. When archaeologists found it, it turned out that there were mummies of at least 180,000 cats in graceful sarcophagi.
The laws of Egypt severely punished anyone who offended the furry purr. A person, even if he injured or killed a cat through negligence, was subjected to painful execution for this, while the one who killed a slave only reimbursed the owner for its cost. In every house there was to be a basket with a lid, where the cat should certainly be placed in the event of a fire. Otherwise, the Egyptians believed, she would definitely throw herself into the fire and burn. The only way to extinguish the fire was … by locking the cat in a basket!
And grateful cats honestly fulfilled their part of the contract concluded with the Goddess. People turned to them for health, many patients annually made pilgrimages to Bubastis, and after worshiping the cat goddess, they were healed of ailments. Cats protected numerous barns from rodents, which turned Egypt into the richest power in the Ancient World.
It was believed, and not without reason, that cats have a rare ability to "negotiate" with almost all spirits from otherworldly worlds. By its mere presence, the cat made the house of its owner impenetrable for any dark forces. That is why the Egyptians so often depicted cats on the doors of their temples and the palaces of the pharaohs. And how could it be otherwise, if the god Ra himself did not hesitate to borrow her fighting skills from the cat when he fought with his enemy - the insidious serpent Apop?
It is clear that other peoples also appreciated the contribution of cats to the prosperity of Ancient Egypt and made a lot of efforts to get them. Egyptian law prohibited the sale of cats to foreigners, and the kara was very harsh for theft and export of a cat abroad, but despite this, the smuggling of cats was a very profitable business, except that the robbery of royal tombs was even more profitable.
And although the Egyptians even created special teams looking for stolen cats and returning them back, they could not do anything, since the cats multiplied quickly and soon filled the entire Mediterranean coast, and then began to move deeper into Europe.
When snakes literally flooded the island of Cyprus, it was Saint Helena who brought cats there from Egypt, and they cleared the island of this creeping evil. A special monastery was built there for cats, which, when the bell rang, went hunting in the morning, and when the bell rang twice in the evening, they came back to feed. Then these trained cats were distributed to the peasants, and they continued to destroy the snakes throughout the island. It is interesting that this monastery exists in Cyprus to this day …
The then Europeans also greeted the cat in the most enthusiastic way. Some kings even issued orders that in each village there was at least one cat, so that there was someone to kill rodents. And people also noticed the magical properties of cats. For example, in the era of the early Middle Ages in Scotland, a legend appeared about the magical kingdom of cats lost among the hills, in which exclusively black kitties with a white shirt front live. Wielding magic, these purrs helped worthy people, and punished the unworthy. In order to fulfill this destiny, they left their wonderful kingdom and lived in the house of a person they had chosen, whom they protected from evil forces and shared their wisdom with him. According to legend, King Charles I had a cat from this magical kingdom. For many years she protected her master from all troubles, but then she died, and a month after that, the king was dethroned from his throne and executed on the scaffold.
The cat has become a heraldic animal - you cannot imagine a more honorable fate, although it cannot be said that it was depicted on the coats of arms so often. Figures of cats also appeared on knightly helmets, that is, they became kleinods. The following qualities were valued in cats: fearlessness, vigilance, love of freedom and independence, as well as … amazing vitality. Everyone knew that a cat can fearlessly rush at an enemy, even if he is larger than her. It is not for nothing that cats have found themselves in many coats of arms, including, for example, the coats of arms of such French communes as Chaurs (Champagne-Ardenne region), the coat of arms of the commune of Saint-Rémy-aux-Bois (Meurthe and Moselle region) and the Wust community (Saxony-Anhalt in Germany).
But then the second part of Bast's prophecy began to come true, according to which cats should not leave Egypt. Rumors about the magical abilities of pussies frightened Christian priests, and they, out of ignorance, declared the cat a "devil spawn", accused that it helps witches to do their black deeds, and the witches themselves, it turns out, can turn into cats. It was argued that "the breath that passes through the skin of a cat is a plague, and if she drinks water and a tear falls from her eyes, then the source will be poisoned: everyone who drinks from it will inevitably die." Cats, especially black ones, were caught by the inquisition all over Europe in order to burn them alive at the stake after cruel torture, while whites were thrown from the bell towers on church holidays! The healing and protective abilities of cats were so misunderstood that the poor animals began to be killed in order to add their blood and fat to various medicinal drugs. The crushed bones of cats were added to a love potion, and both noblewomen and commoners tried to treat their lovers to their meat in order to kindle the "fire of love" in their hearts. And in order for the cats to constantly “protect” the houses of their inhabitants, they were immured alive in the walls of newly built mansions. Well, in the countries of Eastern Europe, sowing in villages began with the fact that they caught the most prolific cat and buried it alive at the edge of the field in order to collect a good harvest from this field in the fall. No, by God, our ancestors were such savages that it cannot be said. Worse than the Papuans, for nothing that in pants …
But cats, even with their death, managed to take revenge on their offenders. Taking advantage of the fact that cats stopped catching them, rats and mice multiplied in an incredible way, and with them plague came to Europe - a terrible "black death". Only in the first half of the XIV century from the plague epidemic in European countries, almost three quarters of their population died, which became the payment for the unreasonable torturers and executioners of the cat tribe.
Moreover, there are legends that cats can punish those who have offended them even after their death. The Japanese, for example, believe that a cat tortured by a man will definitely return to his tormentor and will pursue him in his sleep and in reality until he repays him in full for all the suffering he has endured. There are many legends that tell that a killed cat can appear as if from nowhere, jump on its executioner and push it out of an open window, or throw it under the wheels of a speeding train. The ghost of a cat or cat can easily enter the abuser's house at night and strangle him right in bed.
Well, about our days, we can say that cats have found a worthy place next to people. Today it is our most popular pet living in our home. If you treat a cat well, then it will certainly repay its owners for it. After all, the dwelling in which the kitty happy with everything lives cannot be touched by any evil, and a person with evil intentions simply cannot cross the threshold of such a house. There are cases when in England cats rescued their owners during bombing during the war years, not letting them into the house or driving them out of the house, which then fell a bomb! That is, cats can somehow foresee the future, in other words, they live in the information field not only "behind", but also "ahead" of themselves. It is no secret that a cat can cure its owner from any disease, even sacrificing its life, and there are examples of this. So, one fluffy beautiful cat watched for a long time the torment of her master, who was bedridden with a serious illness, after which she rushed down from the eleventh floor to pay for his health with her death. And here's what is surprising: as soon as the cat crashed, its owner immediately felt much easier, and he himself was able to go downstairs to pick up his deceased savior. Such stories are enough to think about the fact that "there is something here" and … there were people who thought about it to the extent that they quite seriously consider them "alien agents"! And the strange custom is to launch a cat into a new house or a new apartment? It is believed that if a cat enters the house, then everything is fine. You can live. But if not … What does a cat see there that a person does not see? In a word, cats receive some information about the world around them … in a way unknown to us. But is all this inherent in cats alone?
