Many users of social media are cat lovers, if the excess of feline photographs crowding our screens is anything to go by. At the time of writing, the Facebook page of Hong Kong’s favourite cat, Brother Cream, has almost 170,000 likes.
I can’t be a cat lover because I’m allergic to their hair. Empress Wu Zetian, who reigned from AD690 to 705, was also no feline fan, though her reasons were more macabre. While still a consort of Emperor Taizong, of the Tang dynasty, Wu engineered the fall of the emperor’s principal wife, Empress Wang, and his favourite, the gentle Consort Xiao.
Using her beauty, childbearing ability and political acumen, Wu eventually became Emperor Taizong’s empress, and one of the first things she did was to incarcerate Wang and Xiao. Later, enraged that her husband had visited his two former wives, Empress Wu had the two women flogged and their limbs amputated.
Their torsos were placed in vats of wine with their severed arms and legs tied behind their backs. The women screamed in pain for days before they finally expired.
“Wu you slut!” screeched Xiao, as she was tortured. “I’ll be a cat in my next life and may you come back as a rat, so I can tear your throat out for eternity!” Spooked, Empress Wu henceforth forbade any cats to be kept in the palace.