The Cult of the Cat

 

Part II - The Dark Side of the Moon

" Perchance your ruthless errand sent you broomstick-wise across the face of the moon? What arcane rites have you observed? What sorceror's secrets are you privy to?"

Michael Joseph

Encouraged in monasteries by the Celts. It was a positive symbol. Cats appear in the decoration of medieval manuscripts and in carvings in churches and monasteries.

An Irish monk wrote about Pangur Ban his cat companion.

"I and Pangur Ban my cat
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night."

Bastet was identified with Mut the mother goddess and symbol of fertility and fecundity and virginity, as was Demeter and Cerridwen the Celtic goddess. When Christianity swept across Europe so the Virgin Mary replaced these ancient goddesses and took on their attributes.

During the Crusades the concept of 'courtly love' arose with the idealisation of women. Cats too were treated with respect. St Agatha in the Languedoc was also called Santo Gatto - Saint Cat. Cats were a positive force even if that resulted in many being walled up in houses to ward of evil, or buried in cornfields to ensure an abundant harvest.

But by medieval times puss was heading for a fall as her sinister side became more familiar.

Diana, goddess of the moon has a dark side like the moon itself. Diana was goddess of darkness while her brother Lucifer was god of the Sun, Moon and Light. Diana desired him but her brother did not wish to be possessed by the dark and so eluded her. Lucifer had a beautiful cat who shared his bed and one night Diana persuaded the cat to change places with her. From their union was born Aradia the first witch who taught witchcraft to humans.

Connected with pagan cults cats became tinged with suspicion and accused of bringing the plague. They were thought to be witches and burned in their thousands.

Click on the image of the witch and her familiar to see some more mysterious cats.

In 1232 Pope Gregory IX declared that heretics worshipped the devil in the form of a black cat and whipped up a frenzy of cat hatred and killing.

Religious sects arose such as the Albigensians or Cathars (accused of being named after cats because that was the form Lucifer took when he appeared to them) and whose religion was partly Christian and partly of middle-eastern influence. The Knights Templars, though professing Christianity, held secret rites similar to witchcraft and devil worship involving black cats. They may have adopted some aspects of the cat cults they found in the Middle East. Pope Innocent III instigated the Inquisit ion deal with these pagan rebels.

Paganism is for the most part goddess worship. Christianity was and still is to a large extent male-dominated with little room or understanding for women.

The cat is a symbol of domesticity, motherhood and home comforts but she also has her promiscuous side, creature of the night with sharp claws and swaying hips. The church did not trust cats and it did not trust women either.

Medieval times saw the cat descend into the realms of devil worship and witchcraft. People were persecuted for their relations with cats and the cats were persecuted too. What was a natural instinct for a cat to react to building pressure from rain and thunder by washing behind is ears was misinterpreted as the cat bringing the bad weather. Cats were not the only familiars but they are the most enduring. No picture of a witch is complete without a cat, preferably black. Women who kept cats were seen as having an unnatural relationship and men could not understand it.

In England cats were burned inside wicker frames in the shape of the Pope at the coronation of the fiercely anti-Catholic Elizabeth I. The cat had become synonymous with the devil or Antichrist.

Witches were accused of changing into cats to perform spells or to escape capture. In 1566 Agnes Waterhouse was the first woman hanged for witchcraft in England following a trial revolving around the ownership of a white spotted cat called, unfortunately Sathan or Satan, whom she rewarded with drops of her own blood. Isobel Grierson, burnt at the stake in 1607, was accused of assuming cat form, as was Susanna Martin in London in 1692. Isobel Gowdie the famous Scottish witch also changed herself into a cat with the words

"I shall goe intill ane catt
With sorrow, and sych, and a blak shott."

Elizabeth Southern of Lancashire in 1612 had a familiar called Tibb who appeared in several forms, one being a black cat.

Single and widowed women who struck up relationships with feral cats became the subject of hysterical persecution. These women may have been the guardians of the old faith when the Goddess was worshipped, using the old ways of herb lore and fertility rites. What is certain in that they were largely innocent and victims of a paranoid church seeking to dispel the last remnants of pagan customs.

Paganism is just nature worship with a healthy respect for the wild and instinctual side of the world and the cat fits in very well with that. The word itself derived from the Latin 'paganus' meaning peasant.

What the Egyptians saw as a goddess was, with the same attributes now a demon in people's eyes.

It was only in 1951 that the laws against witchcraft were repealed.

Read The Cult of the Cat Part III