part of the family, 1st c bc

www.metmuseum.org
Purchase, Florence and Herbert Irving Gift, 1992

This terracotta relief shows a royal family taking their ease in the company of a few pets. There's mother, father, child, tubby dog having a howl (lower left, on a chain), ducks (lower right) and, partially missing, a monkey (just above the dog).  Expressive and even playful, this scene dates from India during the 1st century BC, and was found at the important Chandraketugarh archaeological site.  (Here is this object's page at the Metropolitan Museum of Art if you'd enjoy more source information.)  What sort of dog might have been around to pamper at that time and place? Sometimes the easiest answer makes the best sense: this looks to me like a well-fed Indian pariah dog, an ancient breed which would have been commonly available. 

a tale from india: the lion, the mouse, the cat

thanks pixabay (CC:00)

Once upon a time a lion had a cave in the hills, where he would have been very content if it wasn't for the cheeky mouse that nibbled him at night.  Tiring of this, the lion hired the best cure for a mouse: a cat. . .but the story doesn't end there.  Does the cat earn his keep?  Does he get his just reward?  Find out in this version of the Indian Hitopadesha fable of the Cat who Served the Lion.  (A more  flavorful translation of the fable, ingrained in its overall story cycle, is here.)

yum

Stella Kramrisch Collection, 1994, www.philamuseum.org. 1994-148-556. believed PD in good faith

You'd think this beast would look happier about snagging this massive shrimp, but maybe Cat here with his quizzical eyebrows realizes he's serving as a bad example.  Painted round 1900 in Kolkata (formerly Calcutta),  this Indian watercolor illustrates a common subject of parody.  Orange and black cats with a mouthful of somebody else represent those holy folk who say they've renounced the pleasures of the flesh, but they haven't.

a sizable pet

A Fraser Album Artist, 1815-1819 Elephant and driver, probably from the Mughal Emperor's stable with a hunting howdar. thanks wikimedia commons (PD)

From a book of anecdotes about pets of the famous:
. . . About the beginning of the seventeenth century, there might have been seen in India at the magnificent court of Jehangir, a favorite of unusual intelligence and size, whose story has come down to us in memoirs written by the Emperor himself. It reads like a page from the Arabian Nights.
“Among my brother's elephants," he says, “was one of which I could not but express the highest admiration, and to which I gave the name of Indraging (the elephant of India). It was of a size I never beheld before —such as to get upon his back required a ladder of fourteen steps. It was of a disposition so gentle and tractable that under the most furious incitements, if an infant then unwarily threw itself in its way, it would lay hold of it with its trunk, and place it out of danger with the utmost tenderness and care. The animal was at the same time of such unparalleled speed and activity that the fleetest horse was not able to keep up with it; and such was its courage that it would attack with perfect readiness a hundred of the fiercest of its kind.
“Such in other respects, although it may appear in some degree tedious to dwell upon the subject, were the qualities of this noble and intelligent quadruped, that I assigned a band of music to attend upon it; and it was always preceded by a company of forty spearsmen. It had for its beverage every morning a Hindostany maun (twenty-eight pounds) of liquor; and every morning and evening there were boiled for its meal four mauns of rice, and two mauns of beef or mutton, with one maun of oil or clarified butter. From among all the others this same elephant was selected for my morning rides, and for this purpose there was always upon its back a howdah of solid gold. Four mauns of gold were moreover  wrought into rings, chains, and other ornaments for its neck, breast and legs; and lastly, its body was painted all over every day with the dust of sandal-wood."
There is something quite captivating in the idea of all this oriental pomp enshrining the favorite of an emperor— in its careful tendance, its perfumes, jewels and musicians—the latter, in particular, being an attention as delicate as unusual.

From Lewis, E. (1892). Famous pets of famous people. Boston: D. Lothrop Company.. 76-77.

a folktale from india: the cat who became a queen

Once upon a time a Kashmir monarch bewailed that though he had many wives, he had no son. Faced with banishment if they didn't come up with one, the royal ladies beseeched the god Shiva, but as the gods tend to do, he answered their prayers a bit left-handedly...with a litter of kittens.

Told that he had a lovely daughter (one of the kittens) and that soothsayers recommended he not see her till her marriage, the ruler managed to be content. And then came the day the kitten-now-grown was to be married to a young prince.

What happened then? Well, thanks to the kindness of the prince and his mother, and the intervention of Shiva's wife Parvati, the cat's tears of frustration and sadness were wiped away. Want to know how? Best read the story!