The best historical artefacts are the accidental ones that freeze a moment in time forever.
I thought I’d try to find all the times pets have ruined their owner's day & recorded that instant for all of history.
I thought I’d try to find all the times pets have ruined their owner's day & recorded that instant for all of history.
These 4,000-year-old mud bricks were stamped with the name and titles of the Sumerian king Ur-Nammu (reigned 2047-2030 BCE) and left out to dry.
However, someone else thought to leave their mark too.
However, someone else thought to leave their mark too.
You can almost hear the brickmaker shooing away his dog from this clay brick that was used in the building of the Ziggurat of Ur (21st century BCE). 
A dog ran over these 2,000-year-old Roman tiles before they could dry, found in the Blackfriars area of Leicester, England. 
It's not just cats and dogs that ruin our days. This Roman tile was stepped on by the hoof of a sheep or goat over 2,000 years ago while it was lying out to dry. 
While the scribe of this 15th-century medieval manuscript from Dubrovnik, Croatia, was working, a cat seems to have jumped first onto the ink container and then on to the book, leaving it marked forever. 
The scribe of this book has written, “Here is nothing missing, but a cat urinated on this during a certain night. Cursed be the pesty cat that urinated over this book… because of it many others did too. And beware not to leave open books at night where cats can come.” 
The scribe of this 13th-century Hebrew manuscript must have left it unattended while an oily-pawed visitor came prowling. 
Cats had an important role in Libraries and Scriptoriums.
They controlled the mice and rats that loved to nibble on the pages of the books and caused a great deal of damage to many manuscripts, such as this one.
They controlled the mice and rats that loved to nibble on the pages of the books and caused a great deal of damage to many manuscripts, such as this one.
This Roman rooftile was left out to dry in Gloucester, England, around 100 CE.
Then a cat and her litter of kittens wandered over it.
Then a cat and her litter of kittens wandered over it.
This 1st-century Roman tile seems to have been left on its side to dry, which created a fun obstacle course for this tiny kitten. 
This pawprint is from a Roman villa in the Rhineland, and was found on the hypercaust that kept the floor and the whole villa warm. 
Recent ultraviolet photography of this Japanese map from the 17th century, depicting the port city of Nagasaki, revealed the paw prints of a cat all over it. 
This medieval Japanese manuscript was going well, until the scribe’s cat decided it wasn’t getting enough attention. 
That's all for now!
Of course, humans are perfectly capable of screwing things up themselves, as this Roman tile shows.
Of course, humans are perfectly capable of screwing things up themselves, as this Roman tile shows.
