One Istanbul cat has its own statue. In November 2016 someone stole it. Two days later it was back.
Tombili, of Ziverbey, Kadıköy, was famous for one photo, reclining on the pavement, and died on 1 August 2016. A petition drew about 16,954 signatures; sculptor Seval Şahin made the statue as a volunteer; Kadıköy Municipality unveiled it on 4 October, World Animal Day. Early November: gone. 8 November: stolen, said the municipality. 10 November: back.
Cat two: Gli of Hagia Sophia, stroked on camera by Barack Obama in 2009. Hagia Sophia reopened as a mosque on 24 July 2020; Gli died that November, aged 16, having outlived the museum.
Cats three to nine: Sarı, Duman, Bengü, Aslan Parçası, Gamsız, Psikopat and Deniz, the stars of Kedi, Ceyda Torun's 2016 film.
Why here? In Islamic law the cat is ritually clean, so it could come indoors. Legend says the Prophet cut off his sleeve rather than wake his cat Muezza; no verified hadith names Muezza, and a similar story sits with a 12th-century Sufi shaykh, Ahmad al-Rifa'i, cat unnamed.
Ottoman Istanbul had a plainer reason: dense housing, unpaved streets, rats. A trade grew around the street animals: each morning the mancacı bought liver, spleen and hearts from the butchers and carried them, skewered, through the neighbourhood.
Today a photographer's line to the BBC fits: neither pets nor strays but a hybrid, looked after by the neighbourhood. Councils neuter for free; residents put out food, water and small cat houses.
Find Tombili's statue in Ziverbey, Kadıköy (exact spot unconfirmed; ask). Then watch the cats the way locals do: from a tea-garden chair, hands off. Before feeding near a mosque, school or park, check: a November 2025 Governorship circular restricts feeding stray dogs there; cats aren't mentioned.
