Text critics who are cat people

I figure we could all use a bit of lighthearted fun during these difficult times, so I give you: textual scholars and manuscript specialists with cats!

Image credit: co-blogger Amy Anderson (used with permission)

Obviously, I would love to include myself in the following list, but since my current landlord doesn’t allow pets, I’m limited to hoping the neighbor’s friendly cat stops by when she’s out prowling the neighborhood, or stopping to pet any cats I find on the street while I’m out running errands. Anyway, some of the rest of us are in alphabetical order.

Amy Anderson

Amy writing a book review. Image credit: Amy Anderson (used with permission).

Christian Askeland

Christian, with his daughter’s cat, “Mouse,” who, I’m told “would kill and eat her human slaves under the right circumstances,” but nevertheless is “super soft and hilarious.” Image credit: Christian Askeland (used with permission).

Josephine Dru

“Easter cat.” Image and caption credits: Josephine Dru (used with permission).

We met on Resurrection Sunday. She was a stray trying to join my friends’ kids in their backyard egg hunt.

[L] This photo may look slightly blasphemous, but please note: 1. my hand is in the human’s spot, and 2. I still consider Bella my second best Easter gift ever.

[R] She insisted on helping. Her contributions were brief but bilingual. Fitting for her middle name (Natanya).

Peter Gurry

Pete getting some help in a YouTube debate.

Dan Gurtner

Gus Gus working on P.Oxy. 403. Image credit: Dan Gurtner (used with permission).

Rendel Harris (1852–1941)

According to this recent biography by Alessandro Falcetta. See Harris and his cat Zenon here.

Hugh A.G. Houghton

Dorcas and Barnabas, before they began work on the ECM. Image credit: Hugh Houghton (used with permission).

Larry Hurtado (1943–2019)

On his cat, Cupar, see the preface to Hurtado’s book, Earliest Christian Artifacts.

David Parker

Source: the possibly-now-defunct “Cats Who Edit” page (HT: Hugh Houghton), thankfully still available here via the Wayback Machine because nothing on the internet ever truly goes away.

Elizabeth Schrader

Elizabeth hard at work. Image credit: Elizabeth Schrader (used with permission).

James Snapp

James (here with Elway) blogs at http://www.thetextofthegospels.com/. Image credit: James Snapp (used with permission).

Klaus Wachtel

Source: “Cats Who Edit“ (see caption above under David Parker’s picture).

Nigel Wilson

Image credit: Wilson’s faculty page at the Faculty of Classics, University of Oxford. Who knew that the legendary palaeographer is a cat person? This is a new life goal for me right here—to make it to a point in my life where I can have a faculty/staff page with a photo like this one.

Mae Gilliland Wright

With Hermione the “office cat” who likes to eat important documents. Thankfully, Mae’s excellently organized thesis on Clement of Alexandria’s text of Paul remains uneaten and available here. Image credit: Mae Gilliland Wright (used with permission).

Honorable mentions:

Whoever runs this Twitter account.

The anonymous monk of Reichenau monastery who wrote (or perhaps copied) the 9th-century poem in Old Irish, Pangur Bán, about ‘hunting words’ while his cat, Pangur Bán, was hunting for mice.

Whoever made and/or owned these manuscripts.

The University of Michigan’s Karanis excavation teams in the 1920s and 1930s, who had dogs and also two cats named Topsy and Sipsy. See Terry G. Wilfong, “Dig Dogs and Camp Cats at Karanis: The Animals of the 1924–1935 University of Michigan Expedition to Egypt“, in Beyond Hatti: A Tribute to Gary Beckman, ed. Collins/Michalowski (Atlanta, Lockwood Press, 2013), pp. 325–341.


UPDATE: I have updated the post to add Dan Gurtner.