It is mostly common knowledge that cats used to be worshipped in the ancient Egyptian times. But I wondered if anyone knew why they were worshipped? Have you?

Cats weren’t really “worshipped”, the idea that they were came from the Egyptian goddess Bastet. She was a goddess with a cat head! Of course she wasn’t the only one with a cat head, but she was definitely the most popular. Some people have said she’s the goddess of cats just by looking at her, but she’s actually the goddess of fertility.

The ancient Egyptians mostly kept cats for their good hunting skills, they would often kill pesky rodents like snakes and scorpions. Another reason is that apparently the ancient Egyptians thought cats were magical creatures and brought good luck to them, although the only information to back this statement up is the mummified cats. Yes, they were mummified.

Oftenly, rich and wealthy families would dress cats up in gold necklaces and even earrings! Those cats were fit for royalty, and quite spoiled. Somehow even more spoiled than me. Cats were known to be sacred animals and a cool thing is that they were actually mummified as offerings to Bastet! It’s sort of like offering to a god or something greater than yourself.

Sometimes mummified cats would even go into the same tomb as their owner. While we’re on the topic of.. Death. The penalty and or consequence for killing a cat, even by accident, was death. Seems fair enough judging by how high status cats were. But alas, those days are over. But will they come back?