Interesting! This cat is complicated and requires an in-depth look. The dearth of information on this specific pattern makes precise identification impossible, but here is a comprehensive analysis of the information available.
First, here are additional images of the cat.
These images (and the third above) were originally posted by Wanwisa Pingchai on Facebook. The group is no longer accessible, but here is a link regardless. A comment by u/SandwichBreath on a Reddit repost has a machine translated version of the text of the original Facebook post: the translation indicates that this cat was found in the mountains near Chiang Mai, and that there may have been two cats in the area with this pattern.
A comment on a popular Facebook repost appears to show the same cat, identifiable by the slight asymmetry in its forehead spots and the shallow notch on the right hand side of the stripe on its nose:
Screenshot posted by kitti.phngs.to.skul; image presumably taken by the Facebook user in the screenshot
This cat is not dyed, nor has the image been digitally manipulated, according to Sarah Hartwell.
Looking at it from the usual standpoint: the border between the colors suggests that this cat is displaying some type of white spotting. The cat is a black tabby underneath the white — the stripes are most visible on the forehead. The pale tan color may come from dust or dirt, as this cat is presumably a stray. If the color is not from dust, it likely shares its coat mutation with the colorpoint(?) cat near the bottom of this post (see there for further discussion).
As has been noticed by others, this pattern may be related to the semi-extinct Thai “skunk stripe” (a white dorsal stripe, traditionally on a black cat), which still appears occasionally in randombred Southeast Asian cats. Occasionally, a white cat with a black dorsal stripe has been depicted in historical art alongside the more common black cats with white dorsal stripes.
Here are some examples of historical art depicting the Thai cat dorsal stripe.
Left: “Butse-weis” (“White Ridge”), the twelfth lucky cat, in an illustration from the 19th century “Smud Khoi of Cats” (“The Cat-Book of Poems”), translation and images accessible here. Right: an illustration from an unattributed 19th century “Tamra Maew” (“treatise on cats”) digitized by the British Library (archived page with many broken images here, images more easily viewed on Public Domain Review)
And here are some real cats from the Facebook page for the PP Thai Cattery.
This pattern is known and is currently being bred for, which means it is not a genetic fluke.
Here is art depicting a pigmented dorsal stripe on a white cat.
Left: an unattributed image initially posted by Cats of Thailand, maybe from a Tamra Maew? Right: not a Thai painting at all, but a 1782 painting by Japanese artist Ganku, held at the British Museum. Despite the artist presumably not having had strong Thai influence, the tortoiseshell-and-white cat in this painting shows a defined dorsal stripe.
Now, white spotting isn’t prone to being “inverted” (you’re not going to be able to get a white cat with black mittens no matter how common it is for a black cat to have white mittens), but the development of pigment on a cat’s body is actually MORE in line with developing a black dorsal stripe as opposed to a white one; cats with high white spotting generally retain the most color on their ears, then tail, and then spine — “skunk stripe” cats lose pigment on their tail and spine but not much of the rest of their body, which is highly irregular in typical development.
So, given that a) there is historical evidence showing that cats with this pattern existed, b) it is possible for Thai cats to display and be bred for sharply delineated dorsal stripes, and c) it is more genetically logical that cats with pigmented dorsal stripes exist over cats with white dorsal stripes, it seems to follow that this pattern is perfectly likely to be real and heritable.
Unfortunately, there does not yet exist terminology to describe it well, even if you assume that it’s just a pattern of white spotting.
Here are some photos of similar cats.
A truly fantastic cat, unfortunately posted on a lost pets group. There is sincerely no explanation for this cat’s color. Its stripes are evident, ruling out white spotting, and it looks for all the world like a typical lynx point, except for that extremely defined back stripe, as though it were a lynx point exposed to impossibly extreme, prolonged cold along its spine and nowhere else. If there is terminology to describe this cat, it is beyond the scope of this blog.
In addition, if this were to be a baffling new colorpoint mutation, that would make it completely unrelated to (for instance) the below cats, who are plainly not colorpoints.
Two kittens without available image attribution. Posted in the comments of the above Facebook repost with the commenter noting that they didn’t know if the cats were Thai in origin. Someone provided a link to a news article that is no longer available; for the sake of thoroughness, here is that link.
And here are various images of cats with white dorsal stripes that attribution could not be found for, sourced from the comments of the aforementioned Facebook repost.
If anyone is able to ascertain the photographers, owners, or original posters of any of these cats, please share; the same goes for any above image where attribution was uncertain or links failed.
Also, if anyone fluent in Thai is able to glean more information from any of the sources here, please share that as well.
So, in conclusion……..black tabby with high white? “Dun-type mutation”? Inexplicable sepia/Himalayan ticked lynx colorpoint error? Escaped alien? Something very, very far above an amateur’s pay grade? Hard to say.
Apologies that this wasn’t as conclusive as usual. Hopefully the provided sources at least give some additional information.
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