THE first known domestic cat in Yorkshire – perhaps in Britain – may once have roamed the banks of the River Tees, keeping down the pest population before returning to its owners in their Romano-British villa for a purr and a stroke and perhaps a full blown cuddle.
The cat’s massively injured remains were discovered 25 years ago at Dalton-on-Tees, near Darlington, during an excavation on which John Buglass was a volunteer digger and he has kindly sent in details following our article about Catcastle, near Lartington, in Teesdale. Catcastle, a rocky outcrop, and the conical-shaped Cat Nab in Saltburn are said to be among the last strongholds of wildcats in this area.
READ MORE: CATCASTLE AND CAT NAB, THE LAST STRONGHOLDS OF THE WILDCATS?
But at Dalton, on the opposite side of the river to Rockliffe Hall’s golf course, there is the first evidence of a smaller, domestic cat living with humans.
An aerial view of the Dalton-on-Tees site showing the shapes in the field which betrayed the presence of a Romano-British villa beside the river. Picture: Mid Tees Research Project
There were two large buildings, plus a series of outbuildings, excavated in a wheat field outside the current village. The buildings are likely to have been the home of native people who lived alongside the Romans, perhaps supplying their fort at Piercebridge with agricultural supplies.
The well at Dalton-on-Tees after it had been excavated and the cat's bones removed. It was about one metre in diameter and five metres deep, and it was lined with red sandstone. Picture: Mid Tees Research Project
A well at the villa was filled in sometime between the 2nd and 4th centuries and in it, archaeologists found 3,700 well preserved bones from 28 species: cow, sheep, pig and horse plus human, and small mammals, reptiles, birds, molluscs and dog and cat.
This really was a case of ding dong bell, pussy’s in the…
An aerial view of the excavation site at Dalton-on-Tees beside the river. Picture: Mid Tees Research Project
Finding the dog was no real surprise. Dogs have been man’s best friend for at least 15,000 years, and the oldest dog burial in this country is believed to be at Star Carr, near Scarborough, a Mesolithic site so the dog is a good 10,000 years old.
But cats were always more solitary. The Egyptians first kept them as pets 4,000 years ago and came to regard them as sacred, perhaps because of their natural aloofness.
Whereas dogs appear fairly frequently in Roman art, there aren’t many depictions of cats which suggests they weren’t very common. Certainly, they weren’t sprawled across every hypocaust in the empire baking their heads senseless.
The villa at Dalton-on-Tees being excavated in 1997-98. Picture: Mid Tees Research Project
It is difficult to say when a cat ceases to be an irritating scavenger that lives next to humans, pilfering their waste, and becomes something more. As it moved from scavenging, it would first become a pest control operative whose presence was tolerated and whose value was acknowledged as it was given shelter and perhaps food.
Then it would become a pet, given food and affection.
The injuries the Dalton feline sustained suggest that it was cared for by someone as if it were a pet.
READ MORE: THERE BE DRAGONS - RIGHT ACROSS NORTH YORKSHIRE AND THE NORTH EAST
It received a massive blow to its left side, which broke its front and back legs. Perhaps it was kicked by a horse or run over by a cart.
Unable to hunt for its own food, it should have died of its injuries. If no one had cared for it, it would have crawled off and quietly passed away. If someone had cared slightly for it, they might have put it out of its misery.
But the Dalton cat survived. Its wounds healed and its bones mended and it lived on.
But life was a struggle. The way the bones healed suggest that movement was a big effort.
“At very least, it would have dragged one of its back legs behind it, depending on how the damaged the muscles were,” says John, who used the bones for his masters dissertation and now runs his own company, JB Archaeology, from Well, near Bedale. “The leg certainly couldn’t have taken any weight on it.”
The villa at Dalton-on-Tees being excavated in 1997-98 with the well, which was first thought to be an oven, at the top right. Picture: Mid Tees Research Project
So even once the bones had healed, this unlucky cat would not have been nimble enough to hunt for its own food.
Someone, therefore, must have cared for it. They must have tended it when it suffered its traumatic injuries, and then kept it alive for the rest of its days by giving it food, water, shelter and, by the looks of things, love.
In a write-up in 2016, the Current Archaeology magazine concluded: “This could be our earliest evidence yet in Britain for a cat that was not just a household tool, but a cherished pet.”
Not just the first feline pet but the first cat with nine lives.
READ MORE: THE HISTORIC, BUT DERELICT, BUILDINGS THAT MAKE UP BISHOP AUCKLAND'S NEW KINGSWAY QUARTER
- With thanks to John Brown, Robin Daniels, Tees Archaeology and John Buglass
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