Cultural Reactions and Folklore
Odd-eyed cats are popular within several breeds, including Turkish Van, Turkish Angora, Sphynx, Persian, Oriental Shorthair, Japanese Bobtail and Khao Manee. In 1817, the government of Turkey, in conjunction with the Ankara Zoo, began a meticulous breeding program to preserve and protect pure white Turkish Angora cats with blue and amber eyes, a program that continues today, as they are considered a national treasure. The zoo specifically prized the odd-eyed Angoras who had one blue eye and one amber eye, as the Turkish folklore suggests that "the eyes must be as green as the lake and as blue as the sky." The mascot of the 2010 FIBA World Championship, hosted by Turkey, was an anthropomorphized odd-eyed Van Cat named, "Bascat".
Muhammad's pet Angora, Muezza, was reputed to be an odd-eyed cat. In the Japanese Bobtail, odd-eyed cats are most frequently found in calico individuals.
Read more about this topic: Odd-eyed Cat
Famous quotes containing the words cultural, reactions and/or folklore:
“If we can learn ... to look at the ways in which various groups appropriate and use the mass-produced art of our culture ... we may well begin to understand that although the ideological power of contemporary cultural forms is enormous, indeed sometimes even frightening, that power is not yet all-pervasive, totally vigilant, or complete.”
—Janice A. Radway (b. 1949)
“Separation anxiety is normal part of development, but individual reactions are partly explained by experience, that is, by how frequently children have been left in the care of others.... A mother who is never apart from her young child may be saying to him or her subliminally: “You are only safe when I’m with you.””
—Cathy Rindner Tempelsman (20th century)
“So, too, if, to our surprise, we should meet one of these morons whose remarks are so conspicuous a part of the folklore of the world of the radio—remarks made without using either the tongue or the brain, spouted much like the spoutings of small whales—we should recognize him as below the level of nature but not as below the level of the imagination.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)