From Ancient Times to the Classical Era

Ancient Times

Among the writers and poets of ancient times who mention cats are Homer, Plutarch, Aesop, Virgil, and Ovid.

Aesop tells us that a female cat in love with a handsome young man asks for help from Venus, who agrees to turn her into a woman metamorphosee en femme [The Woman Who Was Turned into a Cat]). But the cat remains a cat and, despite her transformation, can only chase a mouse across the room. In his Metamorphoses, Ovid describes the transformation of Diana, Apollo's sister, into a cat.

The Middle Ages

In the twelfth century, the cat is found in farces and fables including the Roman de Renart featuring Tibert, a cat who embodies deceit, cruelty, and slyness, just like Renart.

Stories of witchcraft also abound in cats.

The Renaissance

In the sixteenth century, opinions on cats were still divided. Ronsard and Rabelais shared a repulsion for these animals, while Montaigne (Essays) and Du Bellay defended them passionately. Du Bellay even composed a two hundred-verse epitaph in memory of his cat, Belaud.

The Classical Era

In the seventeenth century, writers denounced women's hypersensitivity with regard to cats (Scarron).Fable writers echoed public condemnation of the cat and helped fuel their negative image. La Fontaine still considered the cat a selfish, smarmy, mischievous animal.He used a cat for his caricature of the canon. His cat appeared sixteen times, but the outcome was never in the cat's favor. La Fontaine's cat is the "Attila of rodents" a sly, cruel, deceitful hunter (The Cat, the Weasel, and the Little Rabbit) who selfishly snubs his friends (The Cat and the Two Sparrows). The names of La Fontaine's cats reveal his scorn: Raminagrobis, Raton, Rodilard, Grippe-Fromage, and Grippeminaud.

Rabelais' "stuffed" cats resemble Raminagrobis. Rabelais characterizes the cat as a hypocrite and uses cats to satirize men of the law and their leader, Grippeminault.

In Charles Perrault's Stories or Tales From Olden Times (1697), the feline character Puss in Boots, clever but loyal to his master, is once again a bearer of good luck. As with all fairytales, the author is inspired by folk tradition. This work illustrates how a poor and abandoned younger son gets revenge with the help of his cat. In this very symbolic work, the lunar forces embodied by the cat's magic oppose the solar forces represented by royalty.

In The White Cat by Contesse d'Aulnoy, from her Contes nouveaux ou les fees a la mode [New Tales or New-fangled Fairies] (1698), the cat is again portrayed as a wonderful, protective guide (tutelary genius) who brings luck to the person he serves. Here again, we encounter a multitude of symbols, and the old balance is restored: three solar kingdoms versus three lunar kingdoms.

M.-L. von Franz sees in these two tales the need for the hero to recover his shadow (his cat), that is, to reintegrate his anima into his conscious personality. Based on a Freudian interpretation, Bruno Bettelheim explains that man must learn to trust and accept his unconscious.

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