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| Figure 1: Cat wearing a collar buried at the pet cemetery at Berenice (Source: M. Osypinska) |
Today people often have strong attachments to their pets. This is seen in the language people use to refer to them (e.g., “fur babies”), the multimillion dollar pet food, clothing, and accessories industries, memes, pet animal social media accounts, and more. For a long time people believed that this was a more recent phenomenon, but research is demonstrating that was not actually the case. Today’s blog post will share the results of a decade’s worth of research concerning what may be the world’s oldest pet cemetery.
The port site of Berenice was a Roman period stronghold that served as a trading center for much of the Mediterranean. Various imported and exported goods, including ivory, fabrics, and other high status items from India, the Middle East, and Europe, passed through this city, delighting residents far and wide. Unexpectedly, however, scholars discovered something else at this site: potentially the world’s oldest pet cemetery.
Initially, an archaeological team led by Marta Osypinska and her colleagues at the Polish Academy of Sciences initially discovered a trash dump outside of the city walls. As they excavated further they discovered the remains of hundreds of cats. A fellow scholar at another institution wrote off the discovery, assuming it was an extension of the trash dump, but Osypinska and her team wanted to be certain. This led to a ten-year excavation and analysis that ultimately yielded 585 deceased animals, including cats, dogs, a small sampling of macaques, and one piglet.
Figure 2: Dog buried under a ceramic pot at the pet cemetery of Berenice (Source. M. Osypinska)
The dogs and cats were adorned with collars (Figure 1) and necklaces. Their bodies were carefully placed on mats or under pottery (Figure 2), further demonstrating that this was not a trash dump. Further analysis of the animals’ remains showed that they died from natural (e.g., old age or disease) and accidental (e.g., traumas from falls) causes. Many lived long beyond a time when they would have been able to care for themselves as evidence by toothless animals and animals with healed injuries that rendered them incapable of meeting their daily nutritional needs.
As the evidence came together Osypinska and her team reached the conclusion that these animals were well taken care of and potentially loved by their human counterparts. They may very well have been treated similarly to modern day pets, demonstrating that humans have had a long history of caring from animals outside of utilitarian purposes. Some scholars are hesitant to make this declaration, however. They cite the presence of the cemetery at a port city as potential evidence that these animals were used for utilitarian purposes: they may have protected the imported and exported goods from vermin, pests, or thieves. This may have rendered them indispensable and cherished above other animals, such as farm animals.
While it remains unclear why specifically the residents at Berenice cared so much for these animals they were cared for differently than animals used solely for agricultural purposes. Ultimately, this 2000 year old cemetery is not just the first evidence of a pet cemetery, but it broadens our understanding of human-animal relationships throughout human history.
References
Geggel, L. (2021, March 8). World's oldest 'pet cemetery' discovered in ancient Egypt. Live Science.
Grimm, D. (2021, February 26). Graves of nearly 600 cats and dogs in ancient Egypt may be world's oldest pet cemetery. Science.
Osypinska, M., Skibniewski, M., & Osypinski, P. (2020). Ancient Pets. The health, diet and diversity of cats, dogs and monkeys from the Red Sea port of Berenice (Egypt) in the 1st-2nd centuries AD. World Archaeology, 52(4), 639–653. https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2020.1870545
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