ABSTRACT
When were the fi rst calicos anyway ? Or for that matt er, the fi rst cats? When I originally asked myself these questions, I was thinking about cats like George, for the fi rst part, and Max, for the second. Finding defi nitive answers to such questions, however, is very diffi cult. Illustrations of calicos and magpies (as the black cats with white fronts are sometimes called) have appeared only in comparatively recent times, but their history is no doubt much longer than the artistic or writt en record indicates. It’s possible, as noted earlier, that calicos fi rst appeared in the Orient, where beautiful drawings of the mi-ke (“three fur”) have been found from about A.D. 1000. Where and when they actually originated, however, will probably never be known.
