New Archaeological Evidence Reveals Later Timeline for Cat Domestication in Asia

Summary

The article discusses new archaeological evidence from China that challenges the traditional timeline of cat domestication. While cats were previously thought to have been domesticated around 4,000 years ago in Egypt, recent findings from a Han-dynasty tomb in China (circa 2,000 years ago) show leopard cat remains, suggesting a different domestication path in Asia. The research indicates that cats may have been domesticated much later than dogs and that different wild cat species were domesticated in different regions, with African wild cats becoming the ancestors of modern domestic cats in the West, while leopard cats were domesticated in Asia.