Persian (More...)

Appearance
Beneath all that beautiful fur is a cobby, well-muscled, medium to large cat with short, thick legs. The roundness of the body is emphasized by a massive, round head, a short nose, and large, round eyes. The ears are small, widely spaced, and set low on the head. Eye color depends on the color of the coat. The Persian's dense coat is exceptionally soft and silky; the hairs of both the undercoat and the outercoat are quite long. The Persian's luxurious long hair extends from its ear tufts down to its bushy tail. To accommodate the more than fifty Persian colors and patterns, some North American breed associations organize the Persian into seven divisions: solid, silver and golden, shaded and smoke, particolor, bicolor, tabby, and Himalayan. English registries still categorize each color as a separate breed.
Special Grooming Needs
The Persian's voluminous coat must be combed daily to prevent mats from forming. Monthly baths are recommended.
Origins
Many sources credit the 17th-century Italian traveler Pietro della Valle with introducing the first longhaired cats to Europe. In 1614, Pietro encountered a unique breed of cat with long, silky gray hair in the Persian province of Chorazan and imported a number of these cats to Italy. Soon after, white longhaired cats from Angora (modern-day Ankara, Turkey) were exported to Britain and France, where naturalist Georges Louis Leclerc de Buffon compared them to the Persian, noting that, except for their color, the Persians resembled the cats from Angora. Descendants of these two longhaired breeds exhibited different physical characteristics. Angoras had finer features and were smaller boned than the stockier Persians. By the beginning of this century, cat fanciers in England had chosen the Persian over the Angora. In the United States, Persians replaced the indigenous Maine Coon as the longhaired darling of the cat fancy. Over the years, the Persian has become more stylized in appearance, especially in the United States. Persians today have broader, flatter faces than they did one hundred years ago. Breed standards differ significantly from country to country.
Special Alerts
Breed-related health problems: tear overflow; constricted nostrils (which may lead to noisy breathing and may also make the cat less able to cope with high temperatures); dental malocclusions (teeth that fail to meet each other properly, possibly causing more rapid buildup of plaque and tartar); cherry eye; entropion; polycystic kidney disease; seborrhea oleosa (a skin condition that causes itchiness, redness, and hair loss); susceptibility to ringworm. Persians are also notorious for litter box lapses, at least in part because they dislike having litter granules stuck to their feet and in their fur.