Cat of the Week: China

Each week in this space, we feature an older adult or senior cat (7 years +) in need of adoption or sponsorship. Mature cats make great companions, and unlike kittens, they (probably) won’t climb the curtains! Adopt an older cat, and help them enjoy the best years of their life.

Today we are excited to introduce the lovely little China. She is a 13-year-old lilac Tonkinese mix. China prefers a quiet atmosphere and is having some trouble relaxing in the shelter environment (you might notice she looks scared in her photo). She enjoys having her soft fur rubbed, and she loves being carried around. She has lived with another cat before but would also be happy as an only cat. Wouldn't it be great to see this beautiful lady's frightened look transform into a contented one? Let's help her find a nice quiet home where she will be loved and enjoy life again!

China is currently at the Baltimore Humane Society. Learn more about her here.

Can’t adopt? You can still help! Check out Sammy’s Cat Necessities Fund, which provides money for everyday and medical needs of cats at the Baltimore Humane Society. You can also make a general donation or sponsor a particular animal on this page. Every little bit helps!

Book Review: CatStronauts: Robot Rescue

Today we are pleased to bring you our review of the fourth book in Drew Brockington’s CatStronauts series: Robot Rescue. We love this series of graphic novels in which cats explore space, and Robot Rescue may be our favorite so far.

In this volume, Cat-Stro-Bot—a robot created by Blanket the cat—is on the surface of Europa constructing a drill to search for water, and possibly life. All looks promising until something goes horribly wrong (that’s Kerplow! in comic-book-speak). Direct contact with Cat-Stro-Bot is severed, and it looks like Blanket has lost his best friend. But there is still a signal coming from Europa, indicating the robot is still operational. Unfortunately, Flight Director Maisy says a rescue mission to get him back is a no-go. It’s just too risky.

Poor Blanket sinks into a funk, until his friends Major, Pom Pom, and Waffles team up with him to hatch a plan—one that no one else in CATSUP will know about. All they have to do is get up to the Space Station, where their buddies the CosmoCats have an ion drive ship. They’ll just borrow that ship and zip out to Europa and back in, oh, a short 160 days or so. To cover for their absence, they’ll paint four prototype robots to look just like them and take over their duties at CATSUP.

What could go wrong?

Well, it turns out other space-exploring cats are not so willing to go along with the CatStronauts’ plans. First, our heroes have to stow away on a supply ship to get to the space station, and then they have to steal (ahem, “borrow”) the ion drive ship from the CosmoCats, who are not too pleased about that. Meanwhile, back at CATSUP, the prototype robots are doing a bang-up job with their experiments … until they start, you know, banging things up. Those CatStronauts are going to be in big trouble when they get home!

Our verdict

Okay, we already told you that this may be our favorite CatStronauts book yet, so you know we loved it. The art is a joy, and as with the previous books in the series, we sped through the story once and then went back again and again to enjoy the visual details we missed the first time. This series has strong themes of friendship and teamwork, which show up in this volume as the four CatStronauts band together to rescue a friend who technically is not even alive. But a friend is a friend, we say. It’s easy to fall in love with the CatStronauts; they are cute, adventurous, smart, caring, and willing to engage in high jinks. We think you’ll love the adventure and humor of Robot Rescue. And if you know someone who’s 8–12 years old (the recommended age range), they’ll probably love it too.

Highly recommended!

A note on the "Paws Up" system: Miss C gives either one or two paws up. One paw is for a good read; two paws is for a great read. She never gives three or four paws because that would require her to lie on her back...and Miss C does not do that!

The link below is an Amazon Associates link. If you purchase the book through this link, old SoLT and I could get some coin for our kibble account. Thank you!

Sunday Selfie: Paisley Supervises

This week's Sunday Selfie captures Real Cat Paisley hard at work on her previous week's selfie. Really, nothing would get done around here without a tortie to supervise!

We're joining the Sunday Selfies Blog Hop, hosted by The Cat on My Head!

Caturday Art: Happy Cinco de Mayo!

This is the kind of day we're expecting this Cinco de Mayo:

We're joining the Caturday Art Blog Hop, hosted by Athena and Marie!

Words with Webster: Ounce

We have just one fun Friday feature for you today. Today’s post is all on Real Cat Webster, who has a wild word to share.

Words with Webster

Hi, everybody! It’s me, Real Cat Webster. Welcome to Words with Me. Today’s word is “ounce.” If you missed yesterday’s post about heraldry, you might be wondering what an ounce, as in “16 ounces in a pound,” has to do with cats. Well, that’s not the kind of ounce I’m talking about. My favorite dictionary, Merriam-Webster’s, says that an ounce is also

1. archaic :  any of various moderate-sized wildcats (as the ocelot or lynx)
2. snow leopard
3. archaic :  cheetah
4. a heraldic representation of a leopard

That last meaning is how we heard about this word. You know what’s kind of weird, though? The Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t mention that meaning; it just says that an ounce is a “medium-sized member of the cat family” or snow leopard (the scientific name of which is Panthera uncia).

It’s been a while since we’ve gotten to share a Shakespeare quote, but there is one for this word. Good ol’ Will!

Be it Ounce, or Catte, or Beare, Pard, or Boare with bristled haire. (1600, Midsummer Night's Dream ii. ii. 36)  

This lynx could be called an ounce, although that's kind of archaic.

That quote refers to the "medium-sized cat" meaning, by the way. Here’s one for the "snow leopard" meaning, but it’s not from Shakespeare:

We will, therefore, call that animal of the panther kind, which is less than the panther, and with a longer tail, the ounce... (O. Goldsmith, 1774, A History of the Earth, and Animated Nature III.254)

“Ounce” has been around since about 1300, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. It came from the Old French word once, which used to be lonce, meaning “lynx.” That word came from the Latin lyncea (“lynx-like”), which was from the Latin lynx, which was from the Greek lyngx. The “L” at the beginning lonce may have been dropped along the way because people thought it was an article instead of part of the word.

And just in case you’re wondering, the word referring to a unit of weight also entered English in the early 14th century, but it comes from the Latin uncia, meaning “one-twelfth part.” (The Troy system of weights has 12 ounces in a pound, instead of the 16 we’re more used to.) The English word “inch” has the same origin.

This snow leopard could also be called an ounce.

And if you have been paying really good attention, you probably noticed that the species name of the snow leopard is uncia, which is the same as “one-twelfth part” in Latin. But that’s not what it means in the snow leopard’s name. There, uncia is a Latinized version of the Old French once. So it’s really a Latinized version of an Old French word that came from Latin.

Confusing, no?

Image credits

Photos via Adobe Stock.

Cats in Heraldry

The coat of arms of Benin, featuring
two natural leopards rampant.

Our subject today is a big one: heraldry, and specifically the use and symbolism of cats (mostly wild cats) in heraldry. The subject of heraldry can get complicated fast, but we’re sticking to some basics to keep it simple. First, we'll look at what heraldry is and where it came from, and then we'll explore what cats symbolize and some of the different positions they appear in. Finally, we'll start to explore domestic cats in heraldry.

An extremely brief introduction to heraldry

Heraldry has been around since the late 12th century, according to the website of English Heritage. Just think of knights in those metal helmets with visors that protected their faces. How could anyone tell which knight was which when their faces were all covered up? To solve this problem, knights started painting designs on their shields. Each design was unique to that knight, so people would be able to recognize him. They used different colors for the background, with shapes like crosses and chevrons (the shapes were called “ordinaries”) and emblems that could be shapes (stars, diamonds, crescents, etc.) or animals (birds, hares, deer, lions, etc.). The emblems were called “charges.”

The meanings of different cats in heraldry

The coat of arms of Jersey, with three
lions passant guardant, a position in
which they are known as leopards or ounces.

Not surprisingly, everything in heraldry means something. The cats most commonly used as charges seem to be the “big guys,” like lions and tigers, but smaller wildcats and even domestic cats have been used as heraldic symbols. Below are the meanings of different kinds of cats:

Cat, including wildcat and lynx: Liberty, vigilance, forecast, courage
Leopard or ounce: Valiant and hardy warrior who enterprises hazardous things by force and courage
Lion: Dauntless courage and majesty
Tiger:  Fierceness and valor; resentment; dangerous if aroused

The term “leopard” can be kind of confusing because often the so-called leopards you see in heraldry don’t have spots, and everyone knows a leopard can’t change its spots, right? Well, in traditional heraldry, a leopard was basically a lion in a certain position called “passant guardant.” That just means that the animal is walking (“passant”; the right forepaw is raised to indicate walking) and looking at the viewer, or “on guard” (“guardant”). In more modern heraldry, leopards are depicted with spots just as they appear in real life. A heraldic leopard is also sometimes called an “ounce” (tune in tomorrow to learn more about this word as it relates to cats!).

And while we’re on the subject of words that mean something different than you might think, a beast called a “tyger” has also been used in heraldry. This looks sort of like a lion but not quite. It has no stripes, and it’s sometimes called a “heraldic tiger.”

A tyger, or "heraldic tiger."

More terms used to describe attitudes of animals in heraldry

We introduced the terms “passant” and “guardant” above, but there are several more words you will commonly see and hear when it comes to the positions or "attitudes" of cats and other animals:

Rampant: reared up on the hind legs
Statant: standing, all four feet on the ground
Sejant: sitting on the haunches; the forepaws are on the ground
Couchant: lying down with the head raised
Regardant: looking over the shoulder

Domestic cats in heraldry

It’s easy to find lots of examples of lions and leopards used as heraldic symbols. Many countries feature these cats or other big cats in their coats of arms, as you’ve seen from the examples we’ve shown. But what about domestic cats? Well, we did find several examples. Here are some of our favorites:

The coat of arms of Sakvice, Czech Republic, has a kitty cat statant facing a lion rampant:

The arms of the family of Muyser Lantwyck (Belgium), with a cat that has caught a red mouse:

And the coat of arms of the municipality of Vaugondry (Switzerland) features a gray cat with its tongue out:

Now that you've seen some examples of cats in heraldry, maybe you'd like to create your own coat of arms featuring a cat or cats. This would be a terrific subject for Caturday Art! Just sayin'.

Sources

American College of Heraldry: http://www.americancollegeofheraldry.org/achsymbols.html

"Lion (Heraldry)," Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_(heraldry)

Image credits

All images via Wikimedia Commons. Coat of arms of Sakvice by Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic [Public domain]. Arms of Muyser Lantwyck by Keghel [CC BY-SA 3.0]. Coat of arms of Vaugondry by Delta-9 [CC BY 3.0]. Coat of arms of Benin by Tinynanorobots, Fenn-O-maniC [CC BY-SA 3.0]. Coat of arms of Jersey by Man vyi [Public domain]. Tyger, or “heraldic tiger”: Image taken from A Complete Guide to Heraldry, 1909. [Public domain].

Cat of the Week: Rusty

Each week in this space, we feature an older adult or senior cat (7 years +) in need of adoption or sponsorship. Mature cats make great companions, and unlike kittens, they (probably) won’t climb the curtains! Adopt an older cat, and help them enjoy the best years of their life.

 

Today we are pleased to introduce Rusty, a handsome orange tabby fellow who is 13 years old. Rusty is a laid-back guy who enjoys conversation and getting attention. In his previous home he liked to sleep in the bed with his people. He has also lived with small dogs before. Who wants to take him home?

Rusty is currently at Charm Kitty Café. Learn more about him here.

Can’t adopt? You can still help! Check out Sammy’s Cat Necessities Fund, which provides money for everyday and medical needs of cats at the Baltimore Humane Society. You can also make a general donation or sponsor a particular animal on this page. Every little bit helps!