Although the British royal family is mostly known for being dog lovers, several of its members took a liking to the regal Siamese. Queen Victoria was taken with the Siamese when she first saw one of us at a cat show in the late 19th century and boosted our breed popularity when she adopted a few of us. While Queen Elizabeth II is best known as a dog mom – specifically for her lifelong love of Corgis – it turns out she was once a cat mom, too! She was given a seal point Siamese kitten named Corsham Royal Boy as a wedding gift when she married Prince Philip in 1947.

If I carry myself with a regal bearing and look like I’m a kitty fit for a king or queen, it’s because my ancestors were the companions of royalty! My breed originally came from Thailand, which used to be called Siam – hence the name Siamese. Humans believe that my earliest ancestors were sacred temple cats in the Ayutthaya Kingdom period (1351 to 1767 AD). The earliest illustrations and descriptions of my breed came from a collection of ancient manuscripts called the Tamra Maew (“The Cat-Book Poems”). We made our way to Europe in the late 19th century and made a splash when our breed was first shown at the Crystal Palace Cat Show in London in 1871. Our exotic beauty and elegance was like nothing they had ever seen before! In 1884, the British Consul-General in Bangkok, Edward Blencoe Gould, sent two of my ancestors – a breeding pair named Pho and Mia – back to England as a gift to his sister, Lillian Jane Gould. She fell so in love with us that she started the Siamese Cat Club in 1901. In 1878, the first Siamese cat came to the United States when a diplomat in Bangkok gifted a Siamese named Siam (not the most original name, but nobody’s prrrfect) to American President Rutherford B. Hayes and First Lady Lucy Hayes. The Americans loved us, too, and we were officially recognized by the Cat Fanciers Association in 1906. Over the years, Americans discovered that we had real star power. A pair of us were featured in the 1955 Disney classic Lady and the Tramp and one of us starred in another Disney movie, The Incredible Journey (1963). Throughout history, our unrivaled beauty and loving personalities have made us one of the most recognizable and popular cat breeds around!