Tabby cat
domestic cat with a distinctive coat marked by stripes, dots, lines, or other patterns
A tabby cat, or simply tabby, is any domestic cat (Felis catus) with a coat pattern distinguished by an M-shaped marking on its forehead, stripes by its eyes, cheeks, along its back, and around its legs and tail. Tabby cats display characteristic striped, dotted, lined, flecked, banded, or swirled patterns on the body: the neck, shoulders, sides, flanks, or chest. The four known distinct tabby patterns are mackerel, classic (or blotched), ticked, and spotted. Each is linked to specific genetics.
"Tabby" is not a breed of cat, but a coat pattern. It is common among non-pedigree cats globally. The tabby pattern occurs naturally and is connected both to the coat of the domestic cat's direct ancestor and to those of its close relatives: the African wildcat (Felis lybica lybica), the European wildcat (Felis silvestris), and the Asiatic wildcat (Felis lybica ornata), all of which have similar coats, both by pattern and coloration. One genetic study of domestic cats identified at least five ancestral founder populations.
Etymology
The English term tabby originally referred to "striped silk taffeta". It was derived from the French word tabis, meaning "a rich watered silk".
The public source identifies “Tabby cat” as domestic cat with a distinctive coat marked by stripes, dots, lines, or other patterns. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Tabby, domestic and distinctive.
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This entry incorporates text from “Tabby cat” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.