Roman Roads, Rodent Patrol, and the Feline Invasion

While dogs have shared our homes for at least 20,000 years, the story of domestic cats is less clear. According to a new study published in Science, house cats likely reached Europe only around 2,000 years ago, aided by Roman military routes. By the 1st century CE, domestic cats had made their way to Roman Britain.

A brief history of house cats

Archaeologists have long traced the earliest human-cat interactions to roughly 9,500 years ago in the Levant, where the spread of agriculture created rodent populations that attracted wildcats. Evidence from Cyprus dating to 7,500 BCE suggests cats were already becoming part of daily human life.

Cats were later central to Ancient Egyptian culture, around 3,500 years ago, where they were commonly depicted in art, buried with humans, and even worshipped as manifestations of the goddess Bastet, associated with protection, fertility, and domesticity.

Earlier genetic studies suggested cats may have entered Europe via Neolithic farmers about 6,000 years ago, possibly from Turkey or Egypt. However, distinguishing domestic cats from their wild counterparts using ancient DNA has been challenging, leaving gaps in the feline timeline.

Genes and Roman roads

In the new study, researchers analyzed the genomes of 70 ancient cats spanning 11,000 years (from 9000 BCE to the 19th century CE) from archaeological sites in Europe and Turkey, alongside 17 modern wildcats from North Africa, Italy, and Bulgaria.

The genetic evidence indicates that modern domestic cats reached Europe much later than previously thought—roughly 2,000 years ago—likely introduced from North Africa. Roman soldiers then facilitated their spread along military roads, using the cats to control rodents, much like Neolithic farmers did thousands of years earlier.

Interestingly, cats from earlier periods in Europe and Turkey were genetically European wildcats. Hybridization with domestic cats, rather than true domestication, likely explains the genetic distinctions. Ancient and modern Sardinian wildcats also show closer genetic ties to North African wildcats, suggesting humans brought them to Mediterranean islands rather than them being descendants of early domestic populations.

This research is part of Project FELIX, an EU-funded effort analyzing over 800 archaeological cat samples to better understand the long history of cats and humans.

Evolutionary biologist Jonathan Losos, commenting on the findings, noted, “Ever sphinxlike, cats give up their secrets grudgingly. Yet more ancient DNA is needed to unravel these mysteries of long ago.”

Original reporting by Popular Science.