August 25th, 2010
Daisy and the Legend of the Sacred Birman
I figured it’s time to introduce little Daisy, the newest addition to my household. She’s a Chocolate point Birman, a breed we chose particularly because they are notoriously good natured, and are fine to keep as indoor pets (I don’t have a garden so needed to make sure she’d be okay). She’s also absolutely beautiful – little brown nose and bright blue eyes!
I’m certainly a smitten kitten-spoiler, and seem to be succumbing to her every demand, which mostly mean lots of cuddles and plenty of food. The house seems to have a new princess, and one who eats, sleeps and demands as much attention as I do!
There’s an ancient legend about how her breed came to be, which has often resulted in the term ‘the sacred Birman’ – a name that will no doubt go straight to little Daisy’s head.
This is how birmankitten.co.uk describes the story:
The myth of the Sacred Cat of Birma takes us back a very long time, indeed, many centuries ago, near Lake Incaougji in Indo-china. There lives a rule of monks, known as kittahs. They belonged to the cult of the god Song Ho in the temple of Lao-Tsun. The temple housed the sapphire-eyed golden statue of the goddess Tsun-Kian-Kse who was responsible for residing over the souls of priests when they died. In their vast monastery lived a hundred sacred cats whose job it was to receive the souls of dead monks who later would be reincarnated. When the cat died, the priest’s soul would be released to complete its ethereal journey to paradise.
Each kittah therefore had his own cat, as did a very saintly old monk (some say the Head Monk), Mun Ha, who, accompanied by his white cat Sinh, passes his hours in meditation at the feed of Tsun Kian Tse. The kittahs’ reputation for holiness was well established in the region and infuriated the Brahmans and one night as the holy man meditated in front of the golden goddess, the temple was attacked and Mun Ha died. At the moment of his dead, Sinh, his pure white cat, placed his feet on his fallen master and turned to face the golden goddess, gazing into her eyes. As he did so the hairs of his body turned golden and his yellow eyes became sapphire blue like hers; his four white legs turned earthy brown as did the other extremities of his body – but where his feet rested gently on his dead master they remained white as a symbol fo purity. Thus the soul of Mun Ha passed into the body of Sinh.
Here the legend varies slightly – either the other priests rallied and drove the attackers from the temple or they escaped with their cats and build an underground temple to Tsun Kian Tse in Burma. Sinh singled out a young priest called Ligoa who was thus chosen as the next high priest. By the next day, the rest of the cats also changed colour to match those of Sinh. During the next seven days Sinh refused all food and water and did not leave his maters side He dies peacefully on the seventh day. His spirit and the soul of his master journeyed to their heavenly paradise to be embraced by the great god Song Ho.
