History & Folklore
Many of the cats at the Sanctuary are Manx Rumpies (completely tailless), Stumpies (the mere hint of a stump), or Rumpy Risers (having a small piece of bone or cartilage at the end of the spine). Manx cats probably originated from a mutation which occurred hundreds of years ago and the gene did not die out as the Island is geographically protected.
There are many folk tales and myths as to why Manx cats have no tail, here is one taken from' Manx Fairy Tales' by Sophia Morrison published in 1926.Noah was calling the animals into the Ark, there was one cat who was out mousing and took no notice when he was calling to her.
She was a good mouser, but this time she had trouble finding a mouse and she took a notion that she wouldn't go into the Ark without one.
So at last, when Noah had all the animals safe inside, and he saw the rain beginning to fall, and no sign of her coming in, he said: And with that he was just closing the door when the cat came running up, half-drowned - that's why cats hate the water - and just squeezed in in time.
But Noah had slammed the door as she ran in and it cut off her tail, so she got in without it and that is why Manx cats have no tail to this day. The cat said:
Be bo bend it, my tail's ended, and I'll go to Mann
and get copper nails, and mend it.
The Manx breed originated before the 1700s on the Isle of Man (hence the name), where they are common. They are called stubbin in the Manx language. Tail-less cats were common on the island as long as three hundred years ago. The tail-lessness arises from a genetic mutation that became common on the island (an example of the founder effect).
Folk beliefs claim the Manx cats came from the Spanish Armada; a ship foundered on Spanish Rock on the coast of the Isle of Man. According to legend, the cats on the ship swam ashore and became an established breed. Legend has it that the cats originally went onboard the Spanish ship in the Far East.
The Manx tail-less gene is dominant and highly penetrant; kittens from Manx parents are generally born without any tail. Having two copies of the gene is semi-lethal and kittens are usually spontaneously aborted before birth. This means that tail-less cats can carry only one copy of the gene. Because of the danger of having two copies of the tail-less gene, breeders have to be careful about breeding two tail-less Manxes together. Problems can be avoided by breeding tail-less cats with tailed ones and this breeding practice is responsible for the decreasing occurrence of spinal problems in recent years.
There are various legends that seek to explain why the Manx has no tail. In one of them, Noah closed the door of the ark when it began to rain and accidentally cut off the Manx's tail, who'd been playing and almost got left behind. Another legend claims that the Manx is the offspring of a cat and a rabbit which is why it has no tail and rather long hind legs. In addition, they move with more of a hop than a stride, like a rabbit. This legend was further reinforced by the Cabbit myth. Recent postcards on the Isle of Man depict a cartoon scene of a cat's tail being run over and removed by a motorbike, because motorbike racing is popular on the Island.
Populations of tail-less cats also exist in a few other places in Europe. The population on the isolated Danish peninsula (former island) of Reersø in the Great Belt may be due to cats of Manx origin being shipwrecked on the island.