domestic cat (Cat) comes from African wild cat (Libyan cats). Its global distribution among humans indicates successful adaptation to the anthropogenic environment. There remains uncertainty as to whether domestic cats originated in the Levant, Egypt, or elsewhere in the native range of African wild cats. An international team of scientists led by researchers at the University of Rome Tor Vergata sequenced the genomes of 87 ancient and modern cats. Their results challenge the conventional wisdom about the introduction of domestic cats into Europe during the Neolithic era, instead placing their arrival several millennia later.
Genomes of ancient cats from archaeological sites in Europe and Anatolia (circles on the map) showed that domestic cats were introduced to Europe from North Africa approximately 2,000 years ago, several millennia after the start of the Neolithic in Europe; African wildcats in Sardinia come from a separate wildcat population in North West Africa. Image credit: De Martino etc.., doi: 10.1126/science.adt2642.
The domestic cat has a long and complex, if uncertain, history.
Genetic studies show that all modern cats are descended from the African wildcat, which is found today in North Africa and the Middle East.
However, the few archaeological finds and the difficulty of distinguishing domestic cats from wild cats using bones alone have left serious gaps in our understanding of the origins and distribution of early domestic cats.
“The timing and circumstances of cat domestication and dispersal remain uncertain due to the limited number of ancient and modern genomes analyzed so far,” said Dr Marco De Martino from the University of Rome Tor Vergata and colleagues.
“Questions remain about the natural distribution of African and European wildcats in the past and their potential admixture.”
“A recent study suggests that ancient gene flow may complicate cat dispersal reconstructions, especially based on mtDNA.”
“The origins of African wildcat populations on the Mediterranean islands of Sardinia and Corsica are also unclear.”
“The available evidence suggests that they are not feral domestic cats, but rather a distinct lineage of feral cats.”
To answer these questions, the authors analyzed the genomes of 70 ancient cats from archaeological sites in Europe and Anatolia and 17 modern wild cats from Italy (including Sardinia), Bulgaria and North Africa (Morocco and Tunisia).
Contrary to previous research, they found that domestic cats most likely evolved from the wild cats of North Africa rather than the Levant, and that true domestic cats did not appear in Europe and southwest Asia until several thousand years after the Neolithic.
Previously, cats in Europe and Turkey were genetically European wildcats and reflected ancient hybridization rather than early domestication.
After their introduction, North African domestic cats quickly spread throughout Europe, often following Roman military routes, and reached Britain by the 1st century AD.
Moreover, a new study shows that Sardinian wild cats—both ancient and modern—are more closely related to North African wild cats than to domestic cats, indicating that humans brought wild cats to islands where they did not occur naturally, and they are not descendants of the feral population of early domestic cats.
“We are redefining the timing of the dispersal of cats by identifying at least two waves of their introduction to Europe,” the scientists said.
“The first dispersal most likely involved wild cats from North West Africa, which were introduced to Sardinia and established the island's current wild population.”
“No later than 2,000 years ago, a distinct and as yet unknown population in North Africa became the source of a second dispersal that established the gene pool of modern domestic cats in Europe.”
teams conclusions appearing in this week's magazine Science.
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M. De Martino etc.. 2025. Dispersal of domestic cats from North Africa to Europe about 2000 years ago. Science 390 (6776); doi: 10.1126/science.adt2642
