Black Cats

Black cats throughout history have been the most castigated animals of all time, being tagged as an unlucky omen. Black cats as mythical creatures have appeared besides the likes of witches, and thus have been seen as mysterious and evil.

According to superstitious beliefs, when you are walking along the road and a black cat suddenly crosses your path, a misfortune might befall on you.

And, in some countries, killing black cats that cross your path is aborting the ill luck that might happen to you.

Truly the world evolves around two opposite forces. If a black cat on the one side of the world suffers misfortune at the hands of those who believe they are an abomination, in the other part of the world, black cats are treated as demigods. The origin of having black cat as a good luck is believed to have started in ancient Egypt.

Oagans-Bast was a sacred black cat god in the monotheistic belief system of ancient Egypt. The people who worshipped this god courted and offered favors by acquiring black cats into their households, in the belief that somehow the spirit of their god might come in the body of the black cat that they had, therefore blessing them with prosperity.

Where'd that fly go? Where'd that fly go?

Color truly plays a big role in this world of ours. In world race relations over the centuries, wars have been fought and battles have been won over the issue of color. People often associate color with a certain behavior and personalities, judging and punishing according to their preferential options.

In Sumatra, there is a belief that in order to quench the folks of the long drought brought about by the long summer, a black cat must be found and thrown into the river. While the folks line up at the river bank, they will watch the poor feline swim to its exhaustion, and when exhausted they will let the almost-drowned black cat be allowed to get out of the water.

The women of the village then run chasing the unfortunate black cat while throwing water over themselves and onto the running animal. This scenario is supposed to bring rain to the drought-ridden village. This is a tradition of good luck to the villagers, and a predicament of misfortune to the black cat.

People in the early Christian era also practiced beliefs that put black cats in a dim light. Pilgrims grew suspicious that anything dark or colored black as being of the devil, and to be a part of sorcery. These fundamentalists consisted of Europeans and Englishmen who were a deeply apprehensive group.

Hunting suspected witches was their main endeavor, and they also killed the witch's companion (which they believed was the black cat). Anyone caught with a black cat was assumed to be evil, and should receive the punishment of death.

Even farmers in that era had a negative view of black cats. It is said that if a farmer believes that his farm was cursed and put under a spell, the only solution was to shoot and kill a black cat using a silver bullet.

During Halloween, black cats need to be kept indoors. To this day, some people believe that during Halloween evil spirits use a black cat's body to manifest into the human world, and therefore killing the feline is killing that bad spirit.

The vast majority of people today do not associate any negative properties with black cats. But, because the mythology lives on and a few disturbed individuals will act upon it, it is wise for owners of black cats to take special precautions towards keeping their kitties safe.