An engaging and informative survey of medieval pet keeping which also examines their representation in art and literature. Animals in the middle ages have often been discussed - but usually only as a source of food, as beasts of burden, or as aids for hunters. This book takes a completely different angle, showing that they were also beloved domesticcompanions to their human owners, whether they were dogs, cats, monkeys, squirrels, and parrots. It offers a full survey of pets and pet-keeping: from how they were acquired, kept, fed, exercised, and displayed, to the problems they could cause. It also examines the representation of pets and their owners in art and literature; the many charming illustrations offer further evidence for the bonds between humans and their pets, then as now. A wide range of sources, including chronicles, letters, sermons and poems, are used in what is both an authoritative and entertaining account. Dr KATHLEEN WALKER-MEIKLE gained her PhD at University College London.

Cats were illustrated in medieval manuscripts throughout the Middle Ages, often in exquisite detail and frequently accompanied by their natural prey, mice. Medieval cats were viewed as treasured pets, as fearsome mousers, as canny characters in fables, as associates of the Devil and as magical creatures. Featuring an array of fascinating illustrations from the British Library's rich medieval collection, Cats in Medieval Manuscripts includes anecdotes about cats - both real and imaginary - to provide a fascinating picture of the life of the cat and its relationship with humans in the medieval world.

An engaging and informative survey of medieval pet keeping which also examines their representation in art and literature. Animals in the Middle Ages have often been discussed - but usually only as a source of food, as beasts of burden, or as aids for hunters. This book takes a completely different angle, showing that they were also beloved domestic companions to their human owners, whether they were dogs, cats, monkeys, squirrels, and parrots. It offers a full survey of pets and pet-keeping: from how they were acquired, kept, fed, exercised, and displayed, to the problems they could cause. It also examines the representation of pets and their owners in art and literature; the many charming illustrations offer further evidence for the bonds between humans and their pets, then as now. A wide range of sources, including chronicles, letters, sermons and poems, are used in what is both an authoritative and entertaining account.

Throughout the Middle Ages, medieval manuscripts often featured dogs, from beautiful and loving depictions of man's best friend, to bloodthirsty illustrations of savage beasts, to more whimsical and humorous interpretations. Featuring stunning illustrations from the British Library's rich medieval collection, Dogs in Medieval Manuscripts provides - through discussion of dogs both real and imaginary - an astonishing picture of the relationship of dogs to humans in the medieval world.

- Table of Contents, Introduction
- Excerpts:
- Homer's Odysseus' ancient faithful dog Argos is the only one to recognize him when he returns from the Trojan War after twenty years. Now neglected and covered in fleas, Argos lay on a dung heap by the stables, but pricked up his ears at his master's approach, wagging his tail and dropping his ears. Odysseus saw Argos but is in disguise and cannot greet him, shedding a hidden tear for the loyal hound.
- When French forces took the town of Niort during the Hundred Years War' in 1373, a famous writer of the time saw an old dog lying on the grave of its master, who had died in battle with the English. The dog refused to leave the grave and the Duke de Berry, who was greatly moved by such devotion, arranged for the dog to receive a pension of ten francs for life, which was delivered to a neighbor to feed the animal until it died.
- In 1944 Franklin D. Roosevelt gave a speech in response to a Republican claim that he had sent a destroyer to pick up his dog Fala from the Aleutian Islands at great cost: "These Republican leaders have not been content with attacks on me, or my wife, or on my sons. No, not content with that, they now include my little dog, Fala. Well, of course, I don't resent attacks, and my family don't resent attacks, but Fala does resent them. You know, Fala is Scotch, and being a Scottie, as soon as he learned that the Republican fiction writers in Congress and out had concocted a story that I'd left him behind on an Aleutian island and had sent a destroyer back to find him--at a cost to the taxpayers of two or three, or eight or twenty million dollars -- his Scotch soul was furious. He has not been the same dog since."
- Chips was a German Shepherd-Collie-Husky mix who served with the Third Infantry Division during World War II. When Chips and his handler (Pvt John P. Rowell) were pinned down by a machine-gun nest, Chips stormed into the pillbox, grabbed one of the Italian soldiers and forced the other four to leave the pillbox, where they surrendered to U.S. troops. Later that day, he assisted in the capture of ten soldiers. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver Star, and the Purple Heart. But these were later taken away as awards to animals were "contrary to Army policy." Nevertheless his own unit awarded him (unofficially) with a Theater Ribbon and eight campaign Battle stars.

Regal, elegant, affectionate, calculating, and of course utterly adorable, the cat has been part of our lives for millennia. The Cat Book pairs stunning historical illustrations with informative and amusing text in a tour of feline history from the earliest days of civilisation to the twenty-first century. Taking in the cat goddess of Ancient Egypt, where people shaved their eyebrows to mourn the death of a cat, the medieval Irish law that calculated a cat's value at three cows, Samuel Johnson's doting care for his oyster-loving cat Hodge, Oscar, the ship's cat that survived three shipwrecks in the Second World War, and the cats of famous people from Cardinal Richelieu to Edward Lear, this is the perfect gift for the cat lover - a guide to the role of cats in history and the people who have loved them.