Maltese cat
The Maltese cat is the light gray-blue variant of the historical long-haired Angora cat .
Historical names for blue-gray long-haired cats
Before cat breeding began in Great Britain in the early 20th century, long-haired cats were generally referred to as Angora cats and were named after their coat color and the like. a. names of geographical origin awarded. Since the 17th century at the beginning of the seafaring era, unusual specimens first from the Near East , later also in connection with the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway from China and the Russian Empire found their way as house cats in European aristocratic noble houses, monochrome, long-haired,
- white cats from the Angora region of the Ottoman Empire Angora cats ,
- dark blue-gray Angora cats from Russia Russian cats and / or Carthusians ,
- light gray-blue Angora cats Maltese
- yellow angora cats from China Chinese cats
called.
history
The island of Malta was occupied by the Arabs from 870 to 1090 , who gave the island its name and introduced Islam. Since the Angora cat had its origin in the Fertile Crescent , and it is also reported that Mohammed kept such cats , it would be obvious that the Arabs brought this cat with them to the island. It is also possible that the Ottomans brought the cats to the island during their siege of Malta in the middle of the 16th century. In contrast to the Catholic Knights of Malta, previously the Order of St. John , which in the Middle Ages still persecuted cats because they were said to be witchcraft, the Angora cat was kept as a house cat in the Ottoman Empire in the Angoran region , now Ankara. In 1902, this special light blue color, which was still differentiated from gray and blue, was unknown to the leading representative of the English cat breed Marie Frances Simpson , as she describes in her book Cats and all about them . However, it was described in Spain and America a few decades earlier.
In Spanish literature states: "The second kind is the Maltese Chartreux with aschfahler color and some white hair." . Robert Kent James describes on p. 54 in his book The Angora Cat 1898 the predominant solid colors of the Angora cat with: "black, brown, blue, maltese, buff and gray". In the middle of the 19th century there was a major wave of emigration from Malta , in the course of which such cats may have reached America before they became known in England. The Maltese cat found a verifiable mention in American literature in 1848, in which a light opossum-like coat is reported, also in 1858 in the monthly magazine The Ladies' Repository .
The origin of a dark gray long-haired cat out of the Khorassan , an eastern region of the former Persia, now Iran , then as Khorassan or Persian cat is designated, according to Encyclopædia Iranica refuted.
origin of the name
Since the gray except for small white markings on chest, white belly, paws and snout continuous or gray-blue cats without Tabby drawing as a similar color to the then widespread cowls of religious orders such as the Carthusian Order or Order of Malta had , their name for the coat color of these animals was soon used in common parlance. An origin from the Semitic word màlat is also conceivable, which means refuge or harbor. It is interesting that using the first syllable malik means king in Semitic . The root of the word is also contained in the name of the island of Malta , from which the first such cats may have been brought to Great Britain, as the island became a British crown colony from 1814 . Isolated occurrence, especially on an island, consolidates hereditary traits, so that this coat color could manifest itself over generations, especially since Malta consists in particular of blue limestone , which could have served as an excellent camouflage. It is therefore possible that this cat, which is otherwise less common than the white Angora cat , received its name after its import to Europe because of its occurrence in this special language area , just as the Carthusian cats were named after the Latin Cartausia, which is synonymous, or Chartreux in the French variant . The author and illustrator of numerous animal books Jean Bungartz, in his illustrated cat book in 1896, counted the Karthauser cat as "one of the most splendid animals", whose character was somewhat phlegmatic like the other long-haired cats, the Angora cat or the Chinese cat. In addition to the aforementioned cats, he describes identical cats called Icelandic or Cumanian cats. The Icelandic cat is said to have a beautiful blue-gray color, the Cumanian cat is said to come from the Caucasus Mountains, the border mountains of Russia , which is now also assumed for the Angora cat, and to have been white, black or rusty red. However, Bungartz describes the alleged origin of the Angora cat from High Asia, the western Tibet region.
Today's name for gray-blue cats
Today, the term Carthusian cat is popularly used only with the shorthair cats Chartreux and Russian blue , which obviously comes from cats imported from Russia. The term Maltese was also no longer used in the course of the beginning of cat breeding at the beginning of the 20th century when the Angora cat was renamed Persian cat - see History of the Angora cat . Only the project Arche Angora cat is dedicated to the breeding of images of the old long-haired, blue Angora cat variety Maltese cat with the aim of "Back to the origin" .
Appearance
The Maltese cat is a medium-sized cat with a slightly rectangular frame on not too short legs. The head is blunt trapezoidal with a small snout and a medium-long, straight nose. The medium-sized, rounded ears form an equilateral triangle with the tip of the nose. The slightly slanted eyes are yellow-green, green or yellow. The semi-long-haired coat is a solid blue-gray with very little white markings on the paws, belly, chest and muzzle. A silver component is conceivable.
genetics
The blue fur color is diluted to blue by a diluter (= thinner; d / d) of the black eumelanin . The gene that represents the diluter through a mutation has been identified as MLPH (melanophilin). This causes enlarged pigment granules that are distributed unevenly in the hair shaft. This leads to a reduced absorption of light and thus to a lightening of the fur. It is inherited as an autosomal recessive trait. In addition, the inhibitor gene I can act, which by suppressing pigmentation causes the individual hair to be two-colored and thus further brightens the fur optically.
Individual evidence
- ^ Zeno.org Taxonomy according to Alfred Brehm
- ↑ archive.org, The Angora Cat , accessed June 23, 2014
- ^ Illustrated cat book , Jean Bungartz, 1896, pp. 44–48
- ^ The Angora Cat, 1898, Robert Kent James, p. 54
- ^ The house cat , Wilhelm Schuster, 1909, p. 22, p. 25
- ^ Cats and all about them, Archive.org.Retrieved June 26, 2014
- ↑ Diccionario de Agricultura Practica in the Google book search Madrid 1853, Spanish, accessed on July 16, 2014
- ↑ Compendio de Veterinaria 1854, José Ferreira, Macedo Pinto, accessed July 16, 2014
- ^ The Angora Cat, 1898, Robert Kent James, p. 22
- ^ The Angora Cat, 1898, p. 54, RK James
- ↑ brother Jonathan, A WEEKLY compend, p 381 , New York, 1848 retrieved in the Google Book Search June 27, 2014
- ↑ The Ladys Repository, 1858, p. 616 in the Google book search in English, accessed June 27, 2014
- ↑ Origin and history of the long-haired cat ( Memento of the original from July 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed June 23, 2014.
- ^ Encyclopædia Iranica , accessed June 23, 2014
- ^ Illustrated cat book , Jean Bungartz, 1896, p. 49
- ^ Hochasien Zeno.org, Hochasien, accessed July 13, 2014
- ↑ Maltese cat ( Memento of the original from March 19, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed June 23, 2014.
