Editing Maltese cat

{{short description|Cat coat colour}}

[[File:RussianBlueCat.jpg|thumb|The [[Russian Blue]] is one of a number of [[cat breed]]s whose fur is always Maltese all over.]]
[[File:Maltese cat on a bike outside Citadelle, Victoria, Gozo..jpg|thumb|A Maltese cat resting outside [[The Citadella, Gozo]] in Malta.]]
A '''Maltese''' [[cat]] is any whose [[fur]] is completely or primarily grey (often called "blue" by [[Cat fancy|cat fanciers]]) and regardless of [[cat breed|breed]].<ref>[http://onlinedictionary.datasegment.com/word/maltese+cat "maltese cat"]. Online Dictionary from Datasegment.com. Accessed March 24, 2010.</ref> ''Maltese'' is a coat-colour term, not a breed name.

==Description==
There is some evidence of a historical breed with such colouration that existed in [[Malta Island|Malta]],<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Attard |first=George |date=2016 |title=The blue cats of Malta |url= https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar//handle/123456789/21697 |journal=Tesserae |via=University of Malta}}</ref> which may have given rise to the use of the adjective in this context.

There are several cat breeds that always produce "blue" or grey fur, of whom the adjective may be used. These are the [[Russian Blue]], the [[Chartreux]] and the [[Korat]], none of which are associated with Malta. There are several other breeds that often produce blues such as the [[British Shorthair]]. The blue variant of this breed was so common that some thought it was its own breed called the "British Blue".{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}

Regardless of breed, any cat with solid grey colouration has [[cat coat genetics|two pairs of double-recessive genes]] for the non-agouti and colour-dilution traits, and so an exclusive mating between two solid grey cats should always produce solid grey kittens.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}

==Cultural references==
In literature, "The Maltese Cat" is the title of a 1895 [[short story]] (in the collection "[[The Day's Work]]") by [[Rudyard Kipling]].<ref>{{cite book |author1=Rudyard Kipling |author-link1=Rudyard_Kipling |title="The Maltese Cat" |date=1914 |publisher=Doubleday Page & Company |location=Garden City, NY |edition=The Seven Seas Edition of the Works of Rudyard Kipling |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oVA6AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA231 |access-date=7 July 2019}}</ref> The story is about a [[polo]] match set in [[British Raj|British colonial India]], told from the point of view of one of the ponies, a grey named the Maltese Cat.<ref>{{cite web |last=Wilson |first=Alastair |url=http://www.kipling.org.uk/rg_maltesecat1.htm |title=The Maltese Cat |work=Kipling.org.uk |date=January 30, 2006 |access-date=March 24, 2010}} Notes on and explanation of the story.</ref>

[[Patrick Leigh Fermor]] alludes to this usage in 1986's ''[[Between the Woods and the Water]]'' where, after a game of bicycle polo at a country house on the [[Great Hungarian Plain]], he refers to the bicycles as "Maltese Cats": "The other side won but we scored four goals, and when the iron Maltese Cats were back in their stands, we limped back to the steps, where Countess Denise and&nbsp;... had been leaning on the balustrade like ladies gazing down into the lists."<ref>{{cite book |last=Leigh Fermor |first=Patrick |author-link=Patrick Leigh Fermor |title=Between the Woods and the Water |date=1986 |location=London |publisher=John Murray}}</ref>

[[O. Henry]] alludes to a Maltese cat in his 1908 story [[A Lickpenny Lover]] as being "secretive and wary" when he compares the protagonist - an 18 year old girl Masie - to it.<ref name="Lickpenny">{{cite book |last=Henry |first=O. |author-link=O. Henry |title=A Lickpenny Lover |date=1908 |url= https://americanliterature.com/author/o-henry/short-story/a-lickpenny-lover |via=AmericanLiterature.com |access-date=September 2, 2022}}</ref>

A Maltese cat comes into the kitchen where main character Jim Burden is taking a bath on his first day at his grandparents' Nebraska farm in [[Willa Cather]]'s 1918 novel ''[[My Ántonia]]''.

==See also==
* [[Cat coat genetics]]

==References==
{{reflist}}{{Cat nav}}

[[Category:Cat coat types]]