Giant Chinchilla

The Tamra Meow or Book of Poems of Cats is a Thai collection of richly illustrated verses written between 1350 and 1767 that describes seventeen different cats, some bringing luck and others not. The manuscript lists and poetically describes the cat breeds existing at that time and makes the description of the Burmese. It is possible that Burmese competed in England in the 19th century as Siamese. In 1930, an American sailor brings a Burmese cat to San Francisco: Wong-Mau, whose hazelnut-colored coat showed slight variations in color intensity, stronger at the extremities (paws, tail, head) but without however carrying the pointed pattern. Wong-Mau is purchased by Dr. Joseph Thomson. Another version of the story considers that Joseph Thomson directly brought Wong-Mau from Burma. The doctor made several crosses with cats of Thai origin and notably a Siamese sealpoint in order to reproduce Wong-Mau's coat. The Cat Fancier Association (CFA) recognizes the breed in 1936. The first Burmese are imported to the United Kingdom in the early 1950s and recognized by the Governing Council of the Cat Fancy (GCCF) in 1952. At the end of the 1950s, the Siamese breeding program stopped, and American Burmese breeders considered that their breed only admitted one color: seal sepia, also called sable or also sable in France, that is genetically black sepia. In the 1970s, the type of American Burmese strengthened: the face rounded, as did the eyes and forehead, the body becomes cobby. Until 1984, blue, chocolate and lilac Burmese were registered in a separate breed by the CFA, the Mandalays, while TICA recognized them as Burmese. The differences between the American type Burmese and the English type Burmese became too great and two breeds are now recognized: English Burmese and American Burmese.

The American Burmese is the only Burmese recognized by the American Cat Fanciers Association (ACFA) and The International Cat Association (TICA). The Official Book of Feline Origins (LOOF) and the Cat Fancier Association (CFA) make the distinction between the two types; note that the CFA calls the American Burmese "Burmese" and the English Burmese "European Burmese". The American Burmese is muscular and its weight is surprising relative to its size, so much so that it is said to be like "brick wrapped in silk". The skeleton is robust, the shoulders and hips are slightly rounded and the neck is small to medium-sized. The tail is shorter than that of the English Burmese. The head is round, without any flat parts appearing: the forehead is bulging, the cheeks are full, the stop is very marked and the nose is swollen. The muzzle is short. The eyes are round and well-spaced without being protruding, yellow in color (green and blue are not accepted). The ears are medium-sized, rounded at the end and well-spaced; they are inclined forward. The American Burmese should not look like an Exotic Shorthair. The coat is short and lustrous, close to the body. The pattern is sepia, that is, a solid color subtly shaded on the paws, head and tail. The accepted colors are black (seal sepia or sable or sable), blue, chocolate (champagne) and lilac (platinum). The LOOF accepts crosses between the black American Burmese and the Bombay.