Where Did House Cats Evolve From

Anatomical characteristics such as the rounded head and skeletal structure suggest that all the 37 recognised species within the felidae family evolved from a common ancestor probably living in asia around 10 12 million years ago.

Where did house cats evolve from. Traditionally most scholars believed that all domestic cats had a common ancestor in ancient egypt where cats were domesticated around 3600 years ago. Other researchers believed that domestic cats had more than one ancestor the result of domestication occurring at different times and places each resulting in a distinct ancestral breed 1. Now dna analysis have detected the house cats maternal ancestors back to the fertile crescent egypt israel mesopotamia today iraq syria cyprus. The evolution of the domestic house cat is not as straightforward as you might expect.

All domestic cats the authors declared descended from a middle eastern wildcat felis sylvestris which literally means cat of the woods cats were first domesticated in the near east and some. The earlier ancestors of todays domestic cats spread from southwest asia and into europe as early as 4400 bc. The cats likely started hanging around farming communities in the fertile crescent. The former gathered around human agricultural colonies themselves while the latter 1500 bce seems mainly attractive in behavioral traits.

Domesticated cats originated from near eastern and egyptian populations of fs. In short all cats probably evolved from the prehistoric proailurus which was either the last cat precursor or the first cat. The origins of the house cat while there are a number of wildcat subspecieseuropean and scottish wildcats for exampletodays domestic cat is thought to have descended from the north african wildcat also called the near eastern wildcat. All modern domestic cats are descendants of the near eastern wildcat which was first domesticated in the near east about 10000 years ago.

All cats have evolved as predatory hunting mammals with particularly keen senses of hearing sight and smell. Asia like africa has a good number of wild cats found there so i imagine any new species be found on islands like those of the japanese archipelago taiwan komodo and sri lanka. For decades many theories have existed to explain the origin of cats. Theories of domestic cats.

Africa i doubt since the majority of wild cats found there and if one species did evolve from the house cat it would likely a highly specialised species. Twenty first century science has illuminated some aspects of domestication but lineages remain murky.