"QUI GATTA CI COVA" A SHORT NATURAL HISTORY OF FELIS SILVESTRIS SCHREBER, 1777, IN ITALY

A most highly successful carnivore, the wildcat, Felis silvestris Schreber, 1777, is today dispersed from the south-central Palearctic Biogeographic Region to the Afro-tropical and Oriental Regions, where several subspecies are recognised. Paleontological evidence suggests that this felid maintains almost unchanged its biological model starting from, at least, the Upper Pliocene and/or the Lower Pleistocene. The Italian territory is among the few in Europe inhabited by two different wildcats: the European wildcat, Felis silvestris silvestris Schreber, 1777, dispersed in continental Italy and Sicily, and the African wildcat, Felis silvestris libyca Forster, 1780, which occurs in Sardinia (and Corsica) where it has been introduced by man, very likely in protohistoric times. Recent observations indicate a widening of the range of the species within the national boundaries. Though the felid was known for a long time in the western oecumene, it seems that in Italy the domestic cat may not have become fully widespread until the establishment of the Islamic culture. Since ancient times, the repeated inbreeding of domestic cats with wild individuals has eventually altered the genetic and phenotypic characteristics of the Italian population of the species.