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History Sacred of Burma

It is said that in Burma, many centuries ago, the Khmer lived, a very religious people who venerated the Divinity in its magnificent temples. In one of these (the temple of Lao-Tsun)  dedicated to Tsun-Kian-Kse, the goddess who presided over the reincarnation of souls, there was a very precious gold statue with large eyes in which two splendid sapphires shone.

The monks Kittahs lived in the temple with their one hundred white cats. The oldest and wisest of the monks was Mun-Ha who had as companion Sinh, a white yellow-eyed cat. One day the temple was attacked by raiders who killed Mun-Ha  while he was in deep meditation in front of the statue of the goddess. When Sinh saw his master drawn to the ground, it climbed over his inanimate body staring the goddess intensely in the eyes, as if to ask for justice for what happened.

Then an incredibile transformation came: the mantle of the cat took the golden colour of the goddess,while paws, nose, ears became the dark colour of the earth. Only the ends of the paws, these where based on the body of the monk, remained white as a sign of purity. The raiders fled frightened and the temple was safe. But Sinh didn’t want  to touch food any more and, after a seven days vigil, it died. At the same time all the other cats had the same transformation, taking the same colour and transmitting it to their descendants. This striking legend has allowed that the Burmese were considered sacred. 

THE STORY ALSO GIVES OTHER ASSUMPTIONS.

There are different assumptions about the source of Burmese race.

Poupée de Madalpour was the first Sacred of Burma presented in a feline exibition in 1920. The beautiful cat with white gloves, immediately conquered the French public for its beauty and for the mistery of its origins. On newspapers and texts of that time you can find various news concerning Poupée and Burmese cats but it gives no certainty about the origin of  this breed.

One version says that Poupée was born of a couple of Burmese cats donated by the monks Kittas two French tourists while another speaks of  sacred cats stolen  from the Indocinese temple of Lau-Tsun and bought by American billionaire Vanderbilt who succeed, perhaps illegally, to take possession of a couple of sacred cats.

During the journey  to Europe (1918) the male died, but the pregnant female would permit the spread of the breed first in France and then in the rest of Europe.

Another version says that the Burmese could descend from cats of the Burmese temples, in particolar by cat Sita, taken pregnant in France in 1919 by August Pavie.

The less romantic version, instead, argues that the race is related to Siamese, although probably originating in Burma, and that it has been selected by French breeders in the twenties, at the same time of the Persian Colourpoint, from Kmer cats, a breed popular in Europe until the fifties.  

There is also an “American version” which wants to get the first success with the birth of Debuttante, were not breeders but a team of researchers of Harvard Medical School  interested in expanding their knowledge of genetic and not to create a new breed. It lost track of American cat but, in many countries, selections continued with different hybrids and other subjects, including the famous Burmese cats of princess Ratibor, began to be see at exhibition.

In every case, any version you want to the good, at the end of the tragedy of The Second World War, one only couple of Burmese cats  appeared in the French book of origins and from that couple the race was reconstituted. But the legendary Asian origin is not shared by most geneticists that are based on selections made at the beginning of the century to transfer on cats with long hair the Siamese colouring (Himalayan gene). Then crosses were made between Siamese and Persian and with the Angora cat with blu eyes. This was the beginning of a long road travelled by breeders.

But all the efforts of breeders were  in vain because of the Second World War. Worldwide,, only two couples of Burmese survived and, through these cats the selection began. The Sacred of Burma race saws the official recognition  in 1966. The Sacred of Burma has been imported in Italy in 1978 by Dr. Franca Maria Gabriele, Current Presidente of A.Ga.Bi. (Associazione Italiana Amatori Gatto Sacro di Birmania).