To honor these treasured pets, wealthy families dressed them in jewels and fed them treats fit for royalty. When the cats died, they were mummified. As a sign of mourning, the cat owners shaved off their eyebrows, and continued to mourn until their eyebrows grew back. Art from ancient Egypt shows statues and paintings of every type of feline. Cats were so special that those who killed them, even by accident, were sentenced to death.
According to Egyptian mythology, gods and goddesses had the power to transform themselves into different animals. Only one deity, the goddess named Bastet, had the power to become a cat. In the city of Per-Bast, a beautiful temple was built, and people came from all over to experience its splendor.
Dogs and cats ‘still eaten in Switzerland’
Eating Fido – or Tiddles – might be more commonly associated with China and Vietnam, but rustling up a slice of cured dog meat to enjoy as a snack is not unusual in rural areas of central and eastern Switzerland, Tages Anzeiger claims.
There are no statistics on the number of dogs and cats killed every year in Switzerland and social disapproval of dog-eating means the practice is shrouded in secrecy. No commercial abattoirs slaughter dogs or cats, but farmers in the Appenzell and St Gallen cantons in German-speaking Switzerland often slaughter the animals themselves.
The most popular breed of dog for eating is a close relative of the Rottweiler.
"There's nothing odd about it", one farmer in the Rhine Valley said. "Meat is meat."
Another farmer, from Appenzell, tells of how he knocks dogs out with a club before slaughtering them and handing them to a butcher friend for preparation. A perplexed dog and cat-eater protested to the reporter that the practice never used to be frowned upon.
Animal welfare campaigner Hansuli Huber, spokesperson for the Swiss Society for the Protection of Animals, told Tages Anzeiger that modern people "could no longer imagine eating pets." Yet previous attempts to ban the practice have failed.
In 1993 6,000 people signed a petition calling for dogs and cats to be protected, but Swiss lawmakers decided that the question should remain a matter for personal conscience.
(Neither story has a link because I just copied and pasted them.)
I didn't know that of Switzerland eating habits.
ReplyDeleteI have 4 cats and I could never think of eating them.. LOL!!
I saw some TV shows on cats in Egypt old times and it was very interesting.
JiEL - I've seen images of cooked cat on a stick in Vietnam. I've seen videos of dogs being killed for the meat market.
ReplyDeleteI know that some Asians like to eat cats or dogs meat.
ReplyDeleteTheir food habits are very different than ours.
Their market places out in the open are filled with many kind of animals to sell and serve as meals.
The Huhan market in China was as they said the origine of the COVID19 coming exactly from one of those animals.
The hygene of those countries isn't the same as ours too.
JiEL - I know it's just cultural differences. People eat horses in some countries as well. Personally, I'm a conflicted carnivore. It all makes me very sad.
ReplyDeleteIn Italy horses are eaten, while for the English it would be a horror. I think it is a question of culture. However I think it would be better to eat as little meat as possible in general, also for reasons of good human health.
ReplyDeleteSeveral years ago, a friend in the SF Bay Area (originally from Hong Kong) told me that with the right connections, dog meat is available in certain markets on Stockton Street in San Francisco's Chinatown. I didn't think to ask him about cat meat, as I was most interested in asking about the rats I'd seen being BBQ'd on skewers when I took an evening walk in Xi'an.
ReplyDeleteAnon @3:33pm - Somehow, I'm not surprised to hear about dog meat in San Francisco.
ReplyDeleteNow I know what happened to Fluffy the cat and Tiger the dog on the Brady Bunch that quietly disappeared!🤔
ReplyDelete