Animals like us
Keeping wild
creatures may have been the first step that ancient peoples took
towards domesticating animals. Once caged or encouraged to stay
close with offers of food, such animals would have provided a
reliable contribution to the domestic store-cupboard. Some would
have provided other services in return for their keep: hunting dogs
for example, or rat-catching cats.
But living close to animals may also have encouraged people to
become attached to them and give them human qualities or interpret
their behaviour in human terms (anthropomorphism).
Part of the process of transforming an animal into a pet
involves giving it a name - something that animals cannot do for
themselves. Today's pet owners treat their animals to all the
comforts a human companion would require - special food, their own
bed, toys and even clothes for bad weather.
Making animals human
Through the ages animals have been shown in art dressed up,
walking on two legs or performing human actions - this doesn’t tell
us much about animal behaviour but it does tell us a lot about the
humans that the artist is parodying. Such images of an 'inverted
world' have successfully amused people for centuries (we do not
know what the animals think).
In everyday life, we are familiar with animals even to the
extent of forming relationships with them. And yet we cannot
converse with them or know their thoughts. This familiar yet
different quality makes animals suitable subjects for humour and
satire in particular. By replacing hum
an characters with
animal ones the satirist can, by association, highlight animal-like
qualities in his human subject, such as willingness to follow
others or greed.
Conversely, animals given human qualities can also make a
point.
A satirical papyrus from Egypt in the Twentieth Dynasty (about
1186-1069 BC) shows animals parodying human behaviour. Their animal
qualities are at odds with the human activities they perform in a
reversal of the natural order of things. For example, cats leading
geese.
Sacred and supernatural
The inner life of animals has always been a mystery to humans.
None more so than that of the domestic cat (Felis catus).
Perhaps it was this enigmatic quality that led to the association
of the cat, and many other animals, with the sacred or the
supernatural.
Close observation of animal behaviour would have suggested
particular traits desi
rable in humans.
The goddess Bastet could be depicted as a ferocious lionness, or
as a cat when in a more peaceful role. One of the principal cult
centres of this goddess was at Bubastis in the Nile Delta. Here,
thousands of cat mummies were buried in a special cemetery from the
seventh century BC onwards. We know from other sacred animal cults
in Egypt that the cats would have been bred in captivity, then
culled at a young age, to be mummified and offered for sale to
pilgrims.
As with other creatures sacred to particular deities, it became
very popular in the Late Period (661-332 BC) to bury mummified cats
in special cemeteries as a sign of devotion to the goddess. A
number of cat cemeteries are known from Egypt.
Social status
Horse and rider figures were popular 
grave offerings in
sixth-century Boeotia, a region of Greece. It is likely that the
possession of a horse was a mark of social and even political
status. Laying a model in the grave might show the mourners'
respect for the position the dead person had held in society.
Similar figures have also been found in sanctuaries. A
terracotta horse and rider might have been offered to a god as a
representative of the dedicator, thanking the god or requesting a
favour.
Man's best friend
Dogs have often been called ‘man’s best friend’ and a marble
statue of a pair of dogs dating back to the second century AD,
shows a tender scene. It was found with another similar pair near
Civita Lavinia, modern Lanuvio, Italy. They were acquired in 1774
by Charles Townley fro
m the painter and
dealer Gavin Hamilton, who had conducted excavations at a place
called 'Dog Mountain'.
The name was clearly very appropriate as Hamilton also found
other marble dogs there, a sphinx with a dog's body and two statues
of Actaeon attacked by hounds.
Owners and their pets
Keeping a pet is a two-way trade. The animal gets food, comfort
and safety in return for affectionate behaviour and, perhaps,
obedience. Where the animal concerned is powerful, rare or
expensive, it may also bring its owner status.
People naturally 
become very
attached to their pets and may include them alongside images of
themselves or surround themselves with representations of the
animals they love. Sometimes the owner's relationship with the
animal becomes overly sentimental - even obsessive.
Nineteenth century artist, Dante Gabriel Rossetti loved exotic
animals and began to collect them with a passion after the tragic
death of his wife Elizabeth Siddal in 1862. He was especially fond
of the wombats in his miniature zoo and commemorated the passing of
one of them with an illustrated verse.
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