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Breed Profile

Size: Medium
Origin: Thailand
Colour: White with Brown or Grey points

Javanese cats are intelligent, sociable and playful. They are also friendly with people.

Owner's Guide

Domestic Breed: A long-haired version of the Siamese Cat, closely related to the Balinese Cat. The definition of the Javanese is confusing, to say the least. The name has different meanings in different regions:

1. In the USA: Long-haired Siamese Cats are called Balinese if they show one of the four basic Siamese colour-point patterns (seal, chocolate, blue, or lilac ) and Javanese if they show any other colour pattern. (Some American cat societies do not make this distinction, however, calling them all Balinese.)

2. In New Zealand: Long-haired Siamese Cats are called Balinese if they show any colour-point pattern , and Javanese if they have spotted or self-coloured coats.

3. In Britain: Long-haired Oriental cats, originally bred to recreate the Angora, are now known as Javanese.

Appearance: The elegant, angular, elongated body, the wedge-shaped head, the large ears and the blue eyes are all typically Siamese. The Javanese only differs from the Siamese in the possession of a long, silky coat. And it only differs from the Balinese in the colours of that coat.

History: In America those breeders who were concentrating on developing the Balinese breed in the 1960s found that, from time to time, kittens were born with unusual colour patterns. If these colours did not conform to the basic Siamese colours, they were not accepted as true Balinese. Instead of discarding them, they were placed into a new category, that of the Javanese.

In Britain in the 1960s and 1970s attempts were being made to re-create the Angora Cat, using long-haired variants of Oriental Shorthairs. In 1989 these artificially re-constituted Angoras were given a new name to avoid confusion with the true Turkish Angoras and the name chosen was Javanese. This was done, despite the fact that the American Javanese was already well known. Adding more confusion, some breeders referred to this British form of Javanese as the Cuckoo Cat and formed a breed club called 'The Cuckoo Cat Club". Making matters even more complicated, certain breeders in Holland re-named the British form of the Javanese Cat, calling it the Mandarin Cat. This name has also been taken up in Germany

Just as the Balinese had never existed in Bali, so the Javanese had never seen Java - the name was merely an exotic-sounding Oriental location.

Personality: The same as for Siamese.

Colour forms: Generally speaking, the American Javanese can appear in any colour seen in the Colourpoint Shorthair. Colours listed by the Cat Fanciers Association are as follows:

CFA: Red Point; Cream Point; Seal Lynx Point; Chocolate Lynx Point; Blue Lynx Point; Lilac Lynx Point; Red Lynx Point; Chocolate Tortie Lynx Point; Blue-Cream Lynx Point; Lilac-Cream Lynx Point; Cream Lynx Point; Seal Tortie Lynx Point; Seal Tortie Point; Chocolate Tortie Point; Blue-Cream Point; Lilac-Cream Point.

Outside America, Javanese colours are related instead to those of the Oriental Shorthair.