Cats are such a prominent part of American culture today that it ’s hard to ideate the country without them . But ourfeline friendsarrived on our shores more latterly than you may strike . AsSmithsonianreports , a new field of study published in the journalAmerican Antiquitylinks America ’s first domestic cats to a sixteenth - C shipwreck .
TheEmanuel Point IImet its death around 1559 , when a hurricane stumble and sank it near what ’s now deliberate Pensacola Bay , Florida . The Spanish vas was one of the 11 ship run by the conquistadorTristán de Luna y Arellano . He brought along other settler , soldier , enslaved people , and Aztec Indians on his pursuit to take over the northerly Gulf Coast .
corpse show that one adult and one juvenile cat joined the expeditiousness , peradventure befriending the people alongside . The scientists believe this was the case because the full - grown feline appear to be eating well . After analyzing the cat ’s carbon and nitrogen isotope , the researchers were able-bodied to reason out that it ate fish and various center — a dieting in all probability provided by the sailors .
Although the African tea could have secretly boarded the ship , it ’s plausible they were brought along for blighter control . Seafarers often hadcats as shipmatesto catch the rats and mice , which would otherwise spread disease and damage the vessel . The adult cat on theEmanuel Point IImay have hunted rats , but the evidence shows a “ significant proportionality ” of its diet was n’t gnawer .
The sailors may have give the cat to keep them alive after the ship head for the hills out of varmint — or it ’s potential they just regard the animals as companions who deserve the occasional epicurean meal . Either way , the analyzed remains betoken they were America‘s earliest domesticated computed axial tomography , having arrive 466 age ago .
While keeping pets as kat is a relatively unexampled phenomenon in North America , it ’s an ancient practice overall . According toLive Science , archeologic site in the Middle East , Europe , and Africa show that the first domesticated cats in the earthly concern partner with humans about 10,000 years ago .
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