Leopard cat
Prionailurus bengalensis
— Where the name comes from
Prionailurus joins the Greek príōn, “saw”, and ailouros, “cat”, for the serrated dentition of the genus; bengalensis points to Bengal, where it was described. The common name is purely descriptive — it is the size of a house cat and spotted like a leopard — and implies no close kinship with the latter.
— Facts
- Group
- Mammals · Mammalia
- Order
- Carnivores
- Habitat
- Tropical and temperate forest, plantations, wooded farmland, up to 3,000 m
- Range
- South and East Asia, from Afghanistan to Korea and Indonesia
- Size
- 38–66 cm of body, 1.5–5 kg
- Diet
- Carnivore — rodents, birds, lizards, insects, fish
- Lifespan
- About 10 years in the wild, up to 20 in captivity
— Characteristics
- 01
It is the most widespread small cat in Asia, with twelve recognised subspecies.
- 02
It swims well and colonises islands other cats do not reach.
- 03
Crossed with the domestic cat it produced the Bengal breed.
— What sets it apart
The first domesticated cat in China did not descend from the African wildcat. The excavations at Quanhucun, in Shaanxi, yielded the bones of cats living among Neolithic farmers five thousand years ago, and morphometric analysis established that they were leopard cats. A domestication — or at least a cohabitation — that arose independently, and then came to nothing: the cats living in Chinese houses today all come from the Near East.
