Cats and Mice: The Eternal War

Wordless Wednesday

Cats and mice have been going at it for... well, pretty much forever, or at least as long as there have been cats and mice. This small collection of medieval manuscript illustrations shows the state of this conflict in the thirteenth to fifteenth centuries.

Detail of a miniature of a cat and a rather large mouse
depicted in an herbal from Northern Italy, c. 1440.
Public Domain, via the
British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

Miniature of a cat chasing two mice
(boy, they made big mice back then!).
Depicted in a bestiary from southeast England, c. 1225–1250.
Public Domain, via the
British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

A cat with a bow and arrow does battle with a mouse
armed with shield and spear. Clearly, the use of weapons was
an escalation over previous tactics.
From a Book of Hours, London, c. 1320–1330.
Public Domain, via the
British Library Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

And finally, the detail of the cat from the above
illustration.