" The Cats of Ulthar " is a short story written by American fantasy author H. P. Lovecraft in June 1920.

Considered one of the best short stories of Lovecraft's early period, aspects of the The Cats of Ulthar would be referenced again in the author's works The Other Gods and The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.

Lovecraft outlined the plot to his friend Keiner in May 1920 and wrote The Cats of Ulthar on June 15, 1920, five months after completing his previous tale, The Terrible Old Man.

Dunsany's influence is evident on the surface of the text as well: wanderers, similar to the ones portrayed in The Cats of Ulthar, appear in Dunsany's earlier tale Idle Days on the Yann.

Prior to The Cats of Ulthar, Lovecraft had penned several tales in the style of Lord Dunsany, including The White Ship, The Street, The Doom that Came to Sarnath, The Terrible Old Man, and The Tree.

The Cats of Ulthar was first published in the literary journal Tryout in November 1920, and later appeared in Weird Tales in February 1926 and 1933, as well as being privately reprinted in a forty two-copy run in December 1935.

The Cats of Ulthar was a personal favorite of Lovecraft's, who was an ardent cat lover.

Literary critic Darrell Schweitzer, however, comments that The Cats of Ulthar resembles Dunsany in " mood and execution " only and that " has no obvious parallels in any Dunsany story ".

Atal also appears as a priest in The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath – written in 1927 but not published until 1943 – when protagonist Randolph Carter visits the city 300 years after the events in The Cats of Ulthar, when the town is populated mainly by felines.

The text of The Cats of Ulthar, like many of Lovecraft's works, has fallen into public domain and can be accessed in several compilations of the author's work as well as on the Internet.

* In Alan Moore's " The Courtyard ", Randolph Carter is the name of a female singer who is the head of a band called the Ulthar Cats.

* The priest Atal appears as a boy and youth in two earlier tales, " The Cats of Ulthar " ( 1920 ) and " The Other Gods " ( 1933 ), respectively, which fully describe events alluded to in The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath.

* Tsutomu " Jimmy " Mirikitani ( born 1920, Sacramento, California ), artist and subject of " The Cats of Mirikitani ," an award winning documentary film.