If dogs come from wolves, then where do cats come from?

Question

as simple as i can make it...

Answer 1

easy it really comes the cat family of tigers,bobcats,cheetahs,snow leopard saber-toothed cat,jaguar,begal tiger,sibrerian tiger.

Answer 2

Lions and tigers, oh my!

Answer 3

Dogs don't come from wolfs.  And cats don't come from lions or tigers.  Dogs are the domestic version of the wild dogs found in Africa and Asia.  Same goes for cats.  Domestic cats come from other small wild cats species found in Asia and Africa.

Answer 4

Where do humans come from!?!

Answer 5

Cats just come from wild larger cats like tigers or lions and they have over many years become smaller and a lot safer to keep as pets but there are still quiet a few different types of small wild cats.

Answer 6

The domestic cat is the descendant of the African wildcat (Felis silvestris lybica), which is still common across much of Africa. They are able to interbreed, which can threaten the genetic diversity of their wild ancestors.

In response to Sparky Lee's answer, the civet is not even a cat. It belongs to the family Viverridae, not Felidae (the cat family). It's sometimes referred to as 'civet cat' because of its vaguely cat-like appearance. You cannot assume that an animal's common name bears any relationship to its evolutionary ties. Do you think a koala is closely related to a polar bear, just because it's sometimes called 'koala bear'??

Answer 7

domestic Cats came from 5 different types of wild cats. they all bred together to make domestic cats.

Answer 8

Cats are descended from a North African feline called the civet cat. They were first domesticated by the Egyptians about 7000 years ago. Dogs were domesticated long before then, which is why dogs are more at ease with humans than cats are.

Answer 9

House cats were domesticated from wildcats, /Felis silvestris/.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_cat

To all who said "cats came from tigers and lions", tigers and lions evolved from small felines about 2-3 million years ago.  Vice a versa would be more accurate.  The saber tooth cats branched off the modern day cat lineage twice, with the biggest most known branch, subfamily Machairodontinae which includes the Smilodon, branching off around 20 million years ago.

Answer 10

well cats come from all sorts of big cats. Just like domestic dogs come from wild dogs. also both wild cats and wolves come from an animal that was both a dog and a cat. but it then created wild dogs and cats. It is now extinct though.

Answer 11

Domestic Cats are in the Felidae family, in the genus Felis. Panthers are in the same family, in a different genus. So depending on how far back you want to go, you could say that house cats came from the same common ancestor as lions and tigers and panthers, or you could say that they came from the same common ancestor as all Carnivora; or further back, the common ancestor of all mammals.

Answer 12

Holy c**p!  These answer are unbelievable!  Domestic cats come from the same ancestral lineage as this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/29/scienc...

It is the Near Eastern Wild Cat and is still alive and well, just like the wolf.  No, African Wild Dogs also known as Painted Dogs are not domestic dog ancestors.  Dogs came from ancestral wolf lineages.

Edit:  There are other species of wild cat but genetic studies show that all domestic cats come from the Near Eastern Wild Cat line, not any of the others.

Answer 13

The domesticated cat came from a cat called a wild cat.

Answer 14

tigers or lions