Cats in History

I specialize in Edo art, and in addition to the book "Cats and Kuniyoshi," I have also published a modern-language version of "Oborozuki Neko no Soshi" (The Tale of the Hazy Moon Cat) by Santo Kyozan, illustrated by Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797–1861), titled "Okoma's Great Adventure: Oborozuki Neko no Soshi." Looking at the paintings, I am often surprised to find that cats in the Edo period were just the same as they are today.

I personally love cats, including the way they do unsightly things or get into mischief; I find them adorable. I used to think that this complex way of perceiving "cuteness" was unique to modern people, but as far as Kuniyoshi's cats are concerned, that's not the case. Even though nearly 200 years have passed since Kuniyoshi's time, they are the same, and I feel a sense of kinship.

In modern Japan, the internet is overflowing with photos and videos focusing on the humor of cats, so Kuniyoshi's paintings probably resonate well with the modern era. That is why they are popular.

However, looking at it historically, it wasn't always an era where the cuteness of such naughty cats was celebrated. During the Showa period, for example, there were many paintings of quiet cats sitting politely, and I think the evaluation of cats has changed quite a bit depending on the era.

As you mentioned, Kuniyoshi's cat paintings are very popular now, and I hear that "Cats and Kuniyoshi" is sold abroad and well-received. We held two Kuniyoshi exhibitions at the Fuchu Art Museum, and many people came specifically for the cat section, and they are delighted when we make merchandise. The customer base is clearly different from the usual crowd.

When you look at Kuniyoshi's paintings, there are pictures of cats with smooth fur that look very gentle, which anyone would find "cute," but there are also pictures that cutely depict them as animals full of mischief.

It's a bit different from people who like Maruyama Okyo's paintings of puppies. As Mr. Manabe says, I feel there is an aspect that truly resonates with modern cat lovers, perhaps transcending time.

I feel that the type of cuteness in the puppies Okyo draws and the cuteness in the cats Kuniyoshi draws are quite different.

That's true. Okyo's puppies are for a "general audience," so to speak; their forms are truly well-proportioned, and looking at them makes one feel cheerful. On the other hand, the naughtiness of the cats Kuniyoshi draws is like enjoying the way they are trying their best but being clumsy, right in the palm of your hand.

Kuniyoshi draws mostly adult cats rather than kittens, doesn't he?

That's right. In the case of dogs, it's the puppies that make for a good picture, but for cats, it's the adult cats. Stray dogs are scary, aren't they? In the past, dogs weren't seen as clean animals, and adult dogs weren't considered cute. But puppies are cute. Conversely, I think there's a difference in that cats remain beautiful even when they grow up.

Also, kittens are sort of indistinguishable, messy things that look like balls of yarn. I think it might be difficult to draw that in a way that looks cute.

However, the image I had of Edo-period cat paintings was more of "Bakeneko" (monster cats), giving a strong "scary" impression. Kuniyoshi's cute and funny ones felt surprising. Which is more common in Edo painting as a whole?

As a ukiyo-e artist, Kuniyoshi had a very wide range of work and was a central figure. However, cats were just one part of Kuniyoshi's repertoire, and in the ukiyo-e world of the Edo period, it was mostly just Kuniyoshi and his disciples who drew many cat pictures; there probably weren't that many overall.

It seems the image of the Bakeneko was indeed strong during the Edo period. For example, in old Kabuki, they are almost always depicted as Bakeneko or eerie beings.

So, I think there's an aspect where Kuniyoshi drew cute cats that defied those expectations, and that's why they were found interesting.

Speaking of Bakeneko in Kabuki, it was a signature role for Onoe Kikugoro III. Kikugoro would play a Bakeneko in various plays, and ukiyo-e would be released each time. So, as a result, when we look at ukiyo-e today, I feel the image of Kikugoro's Bakeneko leaves a strong impression.

Also, cats have an image associated with geisha. In the Edo period, there are quite a few stories where a customer falls asleep after enjoying time with a geisha, only to wake up and see that the geisha was actually a cat in disguise, revealing its true form while eating food.

By the early Meiji period, bureaucrats who were former samurai of the Bakumatsu era were quite active in their pursuit of women, so they were criticized in the media. Geisha were called "cats," and because the bureaucrats grew mustaches, they were called "catfish." Many satirical drawings of cats and catfish appeared in newspapers.

Artists like Kawanabe Kyosai drew those, didn't they?

For example, was the acceptance of cats different by region, such as in Edo, Kyoto, and Nagasaki?

As far as I know, there is no evidence that Kuniyoshi's work was sold in the Kamigata (Kyoto/Osaka) region. There were ukiyo-e artists there, of course, but there are almost no cat paintings.

That's a bit surprising. Were there popular cat patterns in the Edo period? Kuniyoshi hardly ever drew black cats, did he?

Black cats are rare. Tabby patterns are also few. In Kuniyoshi's paintings, there are many black-and-white spotted ones.

Was that Kuniyoshi's personal preference?

I wonder (laughs). If you look at "Oborozuki Neko no Soshi," there are various patterns like calico, brown tabby, white, and gray.

So there wasn't much status associated with patterns. Black cats have an eerie image, but was there a rule that Bakeneko paintings always had a certain pattern?

For some reason, calico-like patterns are common.

In many European countries, a black cat crossing your path is considered unlucky, but in Britain, they say it's lucky. Are there cultural differences regarding cats?

Black is mysterious, isn't it? Even in Japan, there are both views of crows as ominous and as auspicious. There is a sense of something special. However, from a pictorial standpoint, I feel that black cats don't quite suit ukiyo-e as a "picture."

Overall, dogs were probably considered more valuable in the Edo period. However, they were rarely kept in specific homes as pets; they were generally called "town dogs" or "village dogs" and received food from various houses.

Even dogs that were owned probably wandered around. They didn't have collars or anything.

Do the cats in Kuniyoshi's paintings wear collars?

Some do. In Santo Kyozan's work, there was a description of how a red crepe collar looked beautiful against the white and black of the cat.

Does that mean it was a mark of ownership?

Yes. And their food bowls were abalone shells, weren't they? I think there was that kind of dedication and affection for them as pets.

As pets, cats might actually be older than dogs.

The spread of so-called pet dogs or lapdogs didn't happen until around the end of the Taisho era. Until then, dogs had some kind of role, and hunting dogs from the West, in particular, were highly valued.

It seems cats were very few in number in the past, and until the Middle Ages, they were often kept on leashes. In the early Edo period, a ban on keeping them on leashes was issued, and as a result, their numbers increased. In historical documents up to the Middle Ages, there are many descriptions of them being treated with care, but as their numbers grew and they were no longer rare, there seems to have been an aspect where they were treated more carelessly.

In rural areas, cats were often kept for catching mice in places doing things like sericulture. Of course, geisha also frequently kept cats as pets. In terms of being pets, geisha and cats are often depicted together in paintings, so it seems the rate of women owning them was high, but the actual reality is not well known.

There is an image that owning a cat is feminine, isn't there?

Yes. The image of "cats and women" as a set has continued for a long time. However, many women also disliked cats. In other words, when doing housework, cats would steal things, so they came to dislike them. People are divided into extremes of those who like cats and those who hate them. Today, quite a few people like them, but in the past, it seems a considerable number of people hated them.

The evaluation has a wide range and has changed quite a bit throughout history.

What happened to the evaluation of cats when the Meiji period began?

Politically, things changed drastically with the Meiji Restoration, but culturally, especially in the first half of the Meiji period, there was strong continuity from the Edo period, so the relationship between people and cats didn't change that much.

For dogs, hunting dogs like pointers and setters were imported during the Meiji Restoration. That caused their status to skyrocket, but for cats, were there cases where Western cats were imported or certain breeds became popular after the Meiji period?

No, there was almost none of that before the war. There were some politicians and others who kept Siamese cats, but they were a tiny minority. It was after the war that people from the occupation forces brought Siamese cats with them, and from there they spread into Japanese society.

The reason dogs were imported and kept was for social status, in addition to practical aspects like hunting. If you took one for a walk, people would respect you, thinking, "Oh, that person has a fine dog."

There are examples of that in paintings as well. There was a master of animal painting named Hashimoto Kansetsu (1883–1945), and he painted Borzois and Greyhounds; they are truly gorgeous paintings. Looking at those, I really feel that Western dogs were a status symbol.

Cats can't help with hunting, but the one thing they are said to be useful for is catching mice, and many people have kept them for that purpose since the Edo period. Especially after the opening of the country, various epidemics came in from overseas. Then, when Robert Koch visited Japan in 1908, his disciple Kitasato Shibasaburo asked for advice on rodent control to prevent the plague, and Koch said, "Extermination by cats is effective." So there was a period when the whole nation campaigned to "keep cats."

However, can that really be called a rise in the status of cats? After all, cats were valued solely for the purpose of catching mice. In fact, once it was discovered later that rat poison was more effective, that movement stopped immediately. It was a very transient thing.

Cats get into mischief and cause problems. Even so, did everyone keep them because their cuteness made up for it?

There are many ways of showing affection. As depicted in Mr. Shimura's "Kumagusu and Cats," there are quite a few differences between how cats were loved in the past and how they are today. There's a description of Kumagusu kicking out a cat that came home dirty.

For both dogs and cats, there was a strict hierarchy between animals and humans, and at the root was the idea that animals aren't something to be treated with that much importance. So, people who loved animals did things that, from today's perspective, look like abuse.

I understand that very well. My grandparents were born in the Meiji era, and while they were by no means abusing animals, from my perspective, I sometimes thought they were treating them very roughly.

Kumagusu was a very temperamental person, so his attitude toward cats was truly unstable. While he would sometimes be very affectionate and sleep with them in his futon, if a stray cat came to the house and caused trouble, he would set out poisoned bait to kill it.

It seems there were quite a few people in the past who cared for their own cats but didn't care for the cats walking around the neighborhood.

That part is a bit incomprehensible to modern people, but perhaps it was like an extension of one's own property.

Does that mean Kumagusu had a partiality for cats among all animals?

I think that can be said. Kumagusu kept various animals, including dogs, pigeons, newts, frogs, and turtles, and he even had scorpions sent from the continent to keep as pets, but he didn't give names to most of them.

Only the cats were given names like "Choboroku" or "Choko," and they appeared frequently in his diary. Whether or not one gives a name might be a dividing line. On the other hand, Soseki's cat didn't have a name.

That's right. "I am a cat. As yet I have no name."

But that's only possible because there's only one. When a cat first came to my parents' house, we gave it a name, but eventually, everyone just started calling it "Neko-chan" (Kitty).

In the past, there were quite a few cats that had multiple names. Since it was normal for them to go in and out of the house, they would get fed in various places and be given different names at each home. Now that indoor keeping has become the norm, you don't see that much anymore.

One of my cats once disappeared for about three months. One day, while my mother was walking around the neighborhood, she saw a cat at a house and thought, "Wait, that's our cat!" The cat approached her looking a bit awkward, as if to say "Oh..." But it was fatter than when it was at our house (laughs).

It must have been well-nourished (laughs). They certainly are shrewd, aren't they?

Cats appearing in Edo-period stories are anthropomorphized and act like humans. Of course, Soseki's cat is also anthropomorphized, but basically, it doesn't exceed the status of a cat kept by humans—meaning it doesn't transform into a monster or take up arms to fight.

In that sense, I think a characteristic of the modern era is that cats gradually became established as cats—beings different from humans, as animals. Even the monster cats (bake-neko) of the Edo period were basically extensions of humans. I think that's where things changed as we entered the modern era.

Cats in the Edo period were certainly heavily character-driven. As you said, modern cats are more naturalistic, or rather, the cat's existence as it is is generally respected.

Is there also a modern way of depicting cats in painting?

For example, there is a Western-style painter named Rinjiro Hasegawa who was an incredible cat lover. The paintings of sleeping cats that Rinjiro drew are cute, but they are a step removed from Kuniyoshi's cats; they show cats exactly as they are.

I think it's a matter of modern reality, but additionally, looking at Rinjiro's work, it's as if he's saying, "I love cats." I feel that expressing oneself as a cat lover is something that emerged in the modern era.

True, expressing that you are a cat lover is a kind of social message. Posting cat photos on social media is certainly the same thing.

That's right. Tadanori Yokoo has been drawing cats for a long time, and you can really feel his emotions through them.

Did the way cats are depicted in Western literature influence cats in modern Japanese novels?

I think it had a considerable influence. You might know more about this, Shimura-san, but it's said that Soseki was quite influenced by British literature featuring cats as protagonists.

Initially, Western depictions of cats entered through the world of children's literature in the mid-Meiji period. While the cats depicted there are somewhat anthropomorphized, many are basically drawn as cats in their natural state, and such depictions entered general novels quite a bit around the end of the Meiji period.

I wonder when our modern attitude toward cats actually began in Japan. I'm curious whether it's something traditional or something imported.

I saw the cats drawn by Kumagusu for the first time in your book, Shimura-san, and what struck me was that many of them—though not all—had human-like faces.

At the time, I wondered if that was an influence from the animals depicted as satire in Europe.

Exactly what kind of influence Kumagusu was under when he drew his cat pictures is a pending issue even among us Kumagusu researchers, but unfortunately, we don't know.

As you pointed out, Kumagusu's drawings are not realistic. They clearly contain human emotions and expressions. One reason for this is that the drawings Kumagusu put effort into were often created to be given to people.

He would project his own impoverished circumstances or his situation of not being recognized by the world onto the cats, and give them to people who acted as patrons to receive some assistance or a fee. So, in a sense, there's an aspect where Kumagusu is drawing himself within the cats.

However, Kumagusu also often drew cats in the margins of his diaries, and there are some mysterious drawings where you wonder why a cat is there (laughs), but those cats live very freely.

At one point, there was even a proposal at the Minakata Kumagusu Archives to keep a cat inside the building, but as expected, it wasn't feasible.

Why not make a cat the director? At least an honorary director (laughs).

The Pet Food Association conducts an annual survey on the number of pets kept, and in 2017, the number of cats kept surpassed that of dogs. While the popularity of cats is rising, when was the turning point that led to them being doted on as they are now?

Basically, I think it gradually became that way after the period of high economic growth. There are various factors, but the biggest one is that people became wealthier and had more leeway, and at the same time, the family structure itself transformed.

As nuclear families progressed and households with only couples increased, instances of doting on cats like children also increased. I think changes in the way society exists are also involved.

Nowadays, even people living alone keep cats.

Cats are probably easy to keep, after all. In the case of dogs, you have to take them for walks, and if they're large, they're often kept outside, but in the case of cats, they can be kept indoors, so they fit the trend of increasing apartment living.

I think veterinarians and others have been recommending it, but keeping cats entirely indoors has become widespread, hasn't it?

Especially in cities, because of traffic accidents.

A cat I used to have was one that came to our house in Aizu-Wakamatsu, but when I had to move to Tokyo, I consulted a vet who said, "It's okay. This cat can adapt," so I kept it inside.

At one point, it finally used the litter box. After that, it didn't want to go outside at all. It's a strange thing. So, being kept indoors isn't painful for a cat.

Cats are quite timid, so they don't really like going to unknown places. Of course, cats have personalities, so I think it varies from cat to cat.

Also, I'm curious about how people obtain cats. In my case, strays just settled in before I knew it, but in the past, cats with pedigrees were highly prized. However, I've heard that the number of people who go to pet shops to buy them has actually been decreasing lately.

Is it decreasing?

Yes, I hear adoptions are common. Public health centers and the animal welfare groups connected to them are working hard, and the adoption of cats that would otherwise be put down seems to be spreading quite a bit.

That's a more heartening story.

The history of buying cats at pet shops isn't actually that long. Apparently, specialized dealers for dogs and birds have existed since the Edo period, but for cats—except for a period of plague countermeasures—there were no specialized shops for a long time, and they finally appeared around the period of high economic growth.

Previously, for example, when celebrities kept cats, many kept Western cats like Siamese or Persians, but recently, rescue cats have come into the spotlight. Right now, Yuriko Ishida's cats are popular on Instagram, and they are also rescue cats. I think the ratio of buying from pet shops has dropped considerably.

One reason cats are hard to sell at pet shops is that it's difficult to establish breeds. If you keep them outside, they fall in love and mix on their own (laughs). If they have a pedigree, they can be sold for a high price, but you can't put a price on a mix.

Of course, there are breeders and cat lover organizations that establish purebred lineages for each breed and sell them with pedigrees.

Another big difference from dogs is that nowadays, there are almost no stray dogs wandering around. There are still quite a few cats, so that's another difference. You can just pick them up.

I heard the cat on the cover of your book ("Cats in Modern and Contemporary History") is a community cat from Waseda University.

That's right. It's a cat cared for by a community cat circle at the university. Doesn't Keio have one?

I haven't heard of one at Mita, but there is an unofficial group called "Cat Circle Hiyoneko" at Hiyoshi.

It seems they are being formed at quite a few universities now. The one created at Waseda seems to be the earliest among universities.

I wonder when the movement to care for cats as a community started.

The name "community cat" (chiiki-neko) itself probably spread around the 90s, but I think organizations actually doing it existed a bit before that. It's said that Isogo Ward in Yokohama was the first where the local government got involved, and since that was successful, it seems to have spread.

What kind of involvement does the local government have?

Within a community, there are people who like cats and people who dislike them, which often leads to trouble. So the local government steps in to hold briefing sessions and build a consensus, saying, "We will make sure they are spayed or neutered, and we will clean up after feeding them," so that the community accepts the presence of the cats for their remaining lifetime.

So it's just for their remaining lifetime. There are still quite a few people who dislike cats, after all.

I think the number has decreased compared to the past, but there are still quite a lot.

Actual damage like breaking things or scratching is one thing, but there are still many people who dislike cats based on a vague image; my father and brother are somewhat like that. They find it unpleasant, as if they're being looked down upon by the cat. Dogs are always looking up at you, right? And they're loyal to humans.

They seem to feel a bit of creepiness in a cat's gaze. That might be connected to the idea of monster cats.

These days, it's probably harder for people who dislike cats to express it, too.

I think the attitude of "I like my cat but I'll kick someone else's" is gradually disappearing on the surface, but in reality, there are still quite a few people who abandon cats, and people who keep them in selfish ways.

Since the cat boom has heated up socially and abandoning cats or culling them has come under heavy criticism, an atmosphere has been created where you can't openly abandon a cat or treat one roughly just because you say you dislike them.

A problem that has emerged recently is cases where even people who love cats end up keeping too many, leading to a hoarding collapse. Those people don't dislike cats, but as a result, they are making the cats suffer.

I hear that in areas where community cats are cared for, unknown cats are often added before anyone knows it. People who find out through the internet or other means come from far away to abandon them.

There was an area in Tanabe City, Wakayama, where this was a problem before, but they were able to manage it in cooperation with civic groups relatively early on. I don't think it has anything to do with Kumagusu's love of cats, though.

If community cats are basically only for their remaining lifetime, is the goal to eliminate cats that are outdoors?

Ultimately, that is the goal.

Meaning they will all be spayed or neutered.

That's right. It seems to be quite effective in central Tokyo. Furthermore, where that is carried out thoroughly is, for example, London. They appear often in Kumagusu's diaries, and they seem to have been there until the 1990s, but now you don't see stray cats at all even when walking through the city. The authorities have completely managed and eliminated stray cats. So, as a cat lover, walking through London is boring (laughs).

Nowadays, in every country in Europe, it's rare to see stray cats in cities. In the past, there used to be a lot of stray cats in places like Italy, but now even in Rome, you don't see them much except in places managed by rescue cat organizations.

It can't be helped if we want to avoid accidents and abuse, but when looking at society as a whole, I also feel a sense of whether a city full of nothing but concrete where even cats can't walk is a good thing.

It might not be unhappy for a cat to stay inside a house for its entire life, but for us humans, there is also a desire to see them walking on top of a wall. But in the end, that is just a human desire, isn't it?

That's true.

Cat cafes and cat islands—many famous cat spots are popping up now, but I think that is a result of cats becoming less common in our immediate surroundings. If there were plenty of stray cats, you could interact with them without going to a cat cafe.

Cat cafes are certainly increasing in Japan, and now there are many cat cafes in Europe as well; it feels like they are spreading across the world.

When we were making the book "Kumagusu and Cats," we had a meeting at a cat cafe in Ikebukuro. It was my first time going to a cat cafe, and they came swarming around me, so it was fun. The fees are quite high, though.

Cats have short lives, and the hardest part is that they always die before humans. Their lifespan is said to be about 15 years. After our pet died, my family was so grief-stricken that we couldn't even get another cat. I am very interested in how people face the death of a cat.

For me, it was harder than when my parents died. I thought I couldn't keep one anymore, and I haven't had one since. I just turned 60 recently, and I find myself thinking that if I were to get a kitten now, I might die before it does.

I wonder why people keep cats when it's that painful.

Why is it so painful when a cat dies? I actually lost weight.

When my first cat died, I really couldn't stop crying. I had never cried even when a relative died, so I kept wondering why. It seems Haruo Sato also couldn't stop crying when his pet cat died and thought about why that was.

Sato wrote that with a human, you can tell they are a different personality if they say something, but with a cat, you have to speculate about what it is thinking. In a sense, when you look at the cat, you are becoming the cat. Because you have become a part of it and are thinking from the cat's perspective, he wrote that when it is gone, it feels as sad as if a part of yourself has been lost, which made a lot of sense to me.

It was painful when my dog died too, but the cat was definitely harder. I loved them both equally, but the feeling when they died was different.

We also had a dog, but I felt there was more of a sense of distance or hierarchy with the dog. Do you still have a cat at the Manabe house?

Yes, we have one. Initially, we started keeping a purebred Russian Blue, a cat that doesn't meow much, but it died at age eight. At that time, I thought I never wanted to keep one again, but I happened to encounter a cat of the same breed born on the day it died. I thought, "Could this be a reincarnation?" and so I started keeping it. It will be 13 soon.

There are stories about cats being reincarnated. People say things like "a cat has nine lives." You don't hear that much in the case of dogs.

That's true.

I wonder why such things are said. There is also the work "The Cat Who Lived a Million Times."

Come to think of it, there are no cats at Mita. A few years ago, a student in the Faculty of Letters, Major in Archaeology and Ethnology wrote a graduation thesis on the theme of cats, and they also said, "I've never seen one at Mita." How many cats are there at Waseda besides this one?

About three. But the number has been gradually decreasing. Apparently, there was a time when it went down to just one; the number has increased a bit again now, but basically, it seems to be on a downward trend.

When I was a graduate student at Kyoto University, there were once three kittens abandoned in a box next to the research building. Abandoning cats at a university might be a classic method.

Kyoto University has a famous dormitory called Yoshida Dormitory, and because someone among the residents will take care of them, it seems they are often abandoned there as well.

The Fuchu Art Museum also had an abandoned cat once in 22 years.

Besides Haruo Sato, I have an image that there have always been quite a few cat lovers among Keio alumni, such as Yukio Ozaki, Mantaro Kubota, Yasuzaemon Matsunaga, Shofu Muramatsu, Yu Ryutanji, and Shintaro Okuno. There aren't many at Waseda before the war.

Actually, the Keio library has many old Western books about cats. The reason is that there was a playwright named Kyota Mizuki (Class of 1919), who was a huge cat lover, but his wife apparently hated cats. Instead of keeping cats, he supposedly collected books about them. When he passed away, they were donated to the Keio library.

In the storage of the Major in Archaeology and Ethnology, there are many excavated lynx bones.

I hear cat lovers buy tons of merchandise. I've heard that while dog lovers are only interested in their own dogs, cat lovers want merchandise in addition to their own cats, which is different from dog lovers, and I think that might be true.

Is that because dogs are beings that are incorporated into a hierarchy within each household?

That's right. There is a part where people like dogs because they are loyal in their relationship with them, whereas with cats, people like them even if they don't pay any attention to them.

Being interested in cats other than your own is a characteristic of cat lovers.