Korat Cat Names, Names For Thai Korat Kittens, Page 4

The Korat appears in a Thai manuscript called the Smud Khoi of Cats — the Cat-Book of Poems — produced during the Ayudhya period between 1350 and 1767. Inside, seventeen cats are illustrated as bringers of good fortune. The Korat is one of them. In its native Thailand the breed has been given to brides on their wedding day for centuries, as a wish for harmonious marriage and prosperous household.

The breed reached the West later than its history suggests. Jean Johnson brought the first two Korats to the United States in 1959. Daphne Negus imported nine more in 1969 to widen the American gene pool. The first UK Korats arrived in 1972, and the GCCF granted Championship in 1984.

A Korat looks like nothing else. The head is heart-shaped when viewed from the front, broad between the eyes and tapering down to a strong chin. The coat is silver-tipped blue — never any other colour, and never tabby-marked in adults — single-layered, short, and glossy enough to throw a silver halo in sunlight. The eyes are the surprise: kittens are born with amber or yellow eyes that slowly shift through every shade of green over two to four years until they reach full luminous peridot green. The breed is also a quiet pioneer of feline genetic medicine — the Korat was the first breed to be DNA-screened for two genetic diseases (GM1 and GM2 gangliosidosis), a testing protocol now standard in many breeding programs.

Naming a Korat rewards the cultural side. Si-Sawat is the breed's actual Thai name, meaning 'good fortune.' Sukhothai and Ayutthaya nod to the historical kingdoms of the Cat-Book era. Mali (jasmine) and Mekong tie to landscape. Thailand exported two breeds to the global cat fancy. The other one — louder, paler, more demanding — lives at our Siamese cat names page.