Shaggy Dogs & Black Sheep by Albert Jack

October 16th 2005


To Bell the Cat

To Bell the Cat is a wonderful expression used to describe any dangerous task carried out at great personal risk. The origin of this phrase and why we use it can be found in William Langland's Piers Plowman (1377). This contains the tale of a family of mice who were constantly being terrorized by the fat, grumpy cat of the neighbourhood. One day the mouse household held a family meeting to discuss how they could best deal with the surprise attacks and the youngest mouse came up with the notion of tying a bell around the cat's neck, so that all the mice would be able to hear him coming. This idea delighted all the others and they danced around in celebration until the wisest old mouse said, 'That's all very well, but who will actually bell the cat?' (No one did in the end.) There is a delightful example of this phrase in action in Scottish history. During the late 1480s, the nobility became deeply suspicious of King James III's apparently homosexual relationship with his favourite new architect, a man called Cochran. Members of court met in secret and discussed ways of eliminating Cochran, who had been affecting their own relationships with the king. As the meeting came to a close, the unanimous decision was that he should be killed, whereupon Lord Gray asked, 'Well, who will bell the cat then?' Archibald Douglas, the feisty Earl of Angus, immediately replied, 'I will bell this cat.'