The Oriental is a cat of Siamese build without the pointed pattern, developed in Britain from the 1950s. It comes in hundreds of colours and patterns, usually with green eyes.
Lively, vocal and attached to people, it shares the character and the health concerns of the Siamese.
The Oriental is a Siamese in every respect except colour. In place of the pointed pattern and blue eyes it has a coat coloured all over, in one of several hundred combinations, and green eyes.
Self-coloured cats arrived from Siam alongside the pointed ones in the nineteenth century, but British clubs decided in the 1920s to promote only the blue-eyed pointed cats. From the 1950s British breeders set out to recreate the others by crossing Siamese with short-haired cats of other colours and breeding back to Siamese. The chocolate cats came first and were called Havana; lilac, white, black, tabby and many more followed.
For years each colour was treated in Britain as a separate breed with "Foreign" in its name, such as the Foreign White and Foreign Lilac. They are all now grouped as Orientals.
The body is long, slender and fine-boned, with long legs and a whip-like tail. The head is a long wedge with very large ears that continue its lines, and slanted, almond-shaped eyes. The coat is short, fine and glossy. Colours include black, blue, chocolate (Havana), lilac, cinnamon, fawn, red and cream, each in solid, tortoiseshell, tabby, smoke and shaded forms. The Foreign White is a pure white Oriental with blue eyes, bred so that it is not affected by the deafness common in white cats.
The Oriental Longhair has a fine, silky coat of medium length and a plumed tail. It was formerly called the Angora in Britain and the Javanese in parts of Europe.
Orientals are intelligent, energetic, talkative and devoted to their people. They want to be involved in everything, dislike being left alone and usually do best with a companion cat.
Grooming is minimal. The inherited conditions are those of the Siamese family: a form of progressive retinal atrophy, for which a DNA test exists, amyloid deposits affecting the liver and kidneys, dental disease and certain cancers. Very extreme head shapes are discouraged by veterinary bodies.
Orientals are recognised by the Governing Council of the Cat Fancy and the international registries. With the short-haired and long-haired forms together, between 600 and 700 kittens a year are registered in Britain.