It’s hard to find a time in history when the everyday affairs of humans were not intertwined with those of animals, as poacher, as prey or as master. It didn’t take long in the development of the human brain for gifted artisans to depict the likenesses other creatures on the walls of the caves of Lascaux, usually in remote spots not normally occupied or scratched into rocks in high places. Were the images used as worship of the creatures depicted? Were they used as part of spell casting to help the hunters with greater harvests or perhaps to bless the creatures for greater fertility? Maybe they were to honor the creatures for what they provided or perhaps the artists just like drawing animals better than human figures.

Ancient civilizations took the creature feature to a higher level bringing examples of them into the home in three-dimensional forms incorporated into furniture. Abundant examples of Egyptian furniture have been discovered that reveal chair legs ending in the paws of a lion. One example that is at least 3,000 years old is in the British Museum. The basic form of the Egyptian bed remained unchanged for 2,000 years. Most of them had legs in the form of animal extremities ranging from heavy bull’s legs with hooves to elegant and graceful gazelle legs to feline legs with paw and claw. This last example perhaps was in keeping with the use of panther hides as bed coverings.

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