We love finding new places where we can enjoy time with cats. Recently, we shared a beautiful new cat co-working space in St. Petersburg, Florida. And here’s something else that caught our eye: a museum exhibit featuring authentic ancient Egyptian cats. But there’s a twist: cats were welcome to attend the museum with their humans in Shanghai!
Images via YouTube/Shanghai Daily and AZPost
Shanghai Museum hosted ‘Meow Night‘ on Saturdays, allowing up to 200 visitors to come with their cats. In all, the exhibit ran for 10 Saturdays and was sold out each time.
“Egyptian archaeological teams discovered a cat temple in Saqqara and unearthed many cat mummies and cat statues. So when we were planning the event, we had cats as a theme, and then came the idea for ‘Meow Night,'” said Shanghai Museum Deputy Director Li Feng.
Images via YouTube/Shanghai Daily and AZPost
One visitor said she learned about how today’s cats descended from those in ancient Egypt and the Middle East.
“I listened to the narrator’s introduction saying … many of today’s pet cats are related to the cats domesticated in ancient Egypt. So I thought I would have to bring my cat here to see its ancestors and the cat goddess,” visitor Qiu Jiakai told Reuters. She attended with a one-year-old cat, An Mao.
As you can see, many of the kitties arrived wearing beautiful Egyptian-themed collars.
Bring Your Cat to the Museum in Shanghai
New York City vlogger Kira makes content showcasing art. In a recent video, she featured the feline exhibit in Shanghai (see video below).
Imagine being there with your kitty to see exquisite ancient artifacts that elevate them to such a grand status! Would your kitty really understand what the art was about? Or would they be able to sense that this was a space where they were revered? What do you think? Whatever the case, it looks like fun!
And we love that the museum took the well-being of the feline visitors seriously, having professional medical staff on hand just in case a kitty needed assistance. At check-in, the kitties needed to verify their vaccination status before going in.
Another video shows the kitties have access to water stations and a “quiet zone” if things get too exciting. Everything was so well-planned so that it went off without a hitch.
“I don’t know if your cat has expressed to you that they want to see ancient Egyptian art. But if you have that feeling from your little fluffy friend, you need to go to Shanghai,” Kira says.
Kira loved the concept so much that she joked that she would get a cat and go to the exhibit in person. (Not really.)
“I mean, I’m not, but I want to!” Kira joked.
Video by TheArtRevival with Kira:
Shanghai Daily also posted a cute video about the exhibit called “The Meow of Museum Night”:
And here is more from Shanghai Eye:
“This special museum night evokes a festive atmosphere reminiscent of the ancient Egyptian festivals dedicated to Bastet,” says Zhang Hong, a reporter at the event with her friend’s black cat.
Egyptian Goddesses with Cat ‘Theophanies’
Although the general view is that Egyptians worshipped cats as if they were deities, that’s not technically correct. But cats and many other animals could be seen as sacred due to their association with many fascinating and powerful goddesses and gods.
Bastet or Bast as seen at the exhibit in Shanghai
As we have shared many times, the Egyptian culture revered felines. We think our kitties would very much like us to remember those days. While people weren’t actually worshipping cats, they were sacred symbols of many powerful and profound deities (More on that next).
Many Egyptian goddesses could have a theophany or manifested appearance as a feline, including:
- Bastet or Bast (Greek Artemis): often symbolized as a black house cat
- Mafdet: As a wild desert cat, cheetah or panther, lynx, African caracal, ocelot, or serval, sometimes a lioness
- Mut: As a domesticated cat or lioness
- Neith: As a lioness or lion
- Sekhmet: a form of Hathor, often symbolized as a lioness
- Seshat: Often seen wearing leopard or cheetah garments
- Serquet: Sometimes portrayed as a lioness
- Taweret: Rarely as a lioness
- Wadjet: Sometimes, as a lioness
Of course, many male deities could appear as lions or cats, too!
We love that the gods and goddesses were of equal importance and that the Egyptians loved felines and all of nature so much! It’s wonderful to see the culture inspiring people all over the world today, including in China.
More scenes from the exhibit by AZPost:
