Episode 211 - The History of Black Cat Superstition

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Abby Brinker (1:17)

Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Lunatics Radio Hour podcast. My name is Abby Brinker. I'm sitting here with Alan Kudan.

Alan Kudan (1:25)

Hello.

Abby Brinker (1:26)

And happy October to you all.

Alan Kudan (1:28)

Thanks.

Abby Brinker (1:28)

This month, October.

Alan Kudan (1:30)

Yes.

Abby Brinker (1:30)

On Instagram, we are posting every day with a little history of different spooky Halloween and horror traditions.

Alan Kudan (1:37)

We're going to have to record 31 of these?

Abby Brinker (1:39)

No, we're posting photo posts on Instagram. But one of those focuses on black cats.

Alan Kudan (1:44)

Black cats?

Abby Brinker (1:44)

Today's episode is going to expand on the history and superstitions of black cats.

Alan Kudan (1:50)

Do you know any black cats in real life?

Abby Brinker (1:52)

I do. I have a Slack channel at work at my 9 to 5, where every Friday people post only their black cats, which I don't know why, but I enjoy it. It's called like Into the Void or something like that.

Alan Kudan (2:04)

Wow.

Abby Brinker (2:05)

Yeah.

Alan Kudan (2:05)

Does Nino count as a black cat?

Abby Brinker (2:07)

Of course he counts.

Alan Kudan (2:08)

How about Peach?

Abby Brinker (2:09)

Nope, Peach is not a black cat.

Alan Kudan (2:11)

Peach is not black?

Abby Brinker (2:12)

No, Peach is like brown and gray.

Alan Kudan (2:14)

I guess I'm just so blindsided by her loud sounds.

SPEAKER_6 (2:17)

Sure, sure.

Abby Brinker (2:18)

Do you know any black cats?

Alan Kudan (2:19)

Just Nino.

Abby Brinker (2:20)

Just Nino.

Alan Kudan (2:21)

He's great.

Abby Brinker (2:22)

Shout out, Nino. Black cats are one of the most recognizable symbols of Halloween. They're associated with witches, bad luck, magic, death, and the supernatural. But they haven't always had a bad rep. In some ancient cultures, they were associated with protection, fertility, and religion. So how did cats go from sacred animals to symbols of witchcraft, and eventually one of the standard images of Halloween?

Alan Kudan (2:45)

I don't know.

Abby Brinker (2:46)

Today we are talking about the history of superstitions around black cats. Of course, let's start with our sources. A British Museum article on ancient Egyptian gods and goddesses, and another British Museum article on the Gayer Anderson cat, a Library of Congress blog post on the history of Halloween traditions, a Smithsonian article by Sarah Mundy, The Good, The Bad, and The Black Cat, and The Rise of Cats and Madness on springer.com.

Alan Kudan (3:09)

Wow.

Abby Brinker (3:10)

All of those will of course be linked in the description of this episode.

Alan Kudan (3:13)

Probably some Wikipedia just because you always do Wikipedia.

Abby Brinker (3:17)

Wikipedia is where you start the journey. You sort of get the outline, you understand where you're going, and then you got to go back it up with some real sources.

Alan Kudan (3:25)

But Wikipedia can't do it without you.

Abby Brinker (3:27)

That's right. I donate every month to Wikipedia. I rely on them heavily. We love them. One of the strongest examples of cats having a positive religious association famously comes from where, Alan?

Alan Kudan (3:40)

The image of the Pope cat.

Abby Brinker (3:42)

What's the Pope cat? I've never seen this before.

Alan Kudan (3:44)

I think it's just the trend of people dressing their cat up like the Pope.

Abby Brinker (3:47)

I understand. It's cute.

Alan Kudan (3:49)

It's really cute. It's just a big hat.

Abby Brinker (3:51)

I was going to say Ancient Egypt. So famously, cats were valued as domestic animals because they helped control rodents and other pests, which is still true to this day. But they also were related to ancient religion in Egypt. The goddess Bastet represented cats, fertility, childbirth, protection and domestic life. She was commonly represented either as a cat or as a woman with the head of a cat. And it's worth correcting a common misconception here. So I think there's a lot of, like, discourse is the wrong word, but discourse on the internet about cats being worshipped as gods in ancient Egypt. But it was more complicated than that. So cats were, of course, living animals at the time, and they were kind of thought of as being able to be possessed by particular deities, right? Especially Bastet. So it wasn't that cats themselves were worshipped as gods. It was that cats could be a vessel that certain gods or goddesses could possess.