If you get up early in Rome you see things you are not supposed to see: a gladiator spooning down a pot of yoghurt before starting a long day posing for photos with Japanese tourists; the "dead moped squad" carrying away rusty carcasses of abandoned bikes, rotting among ranks of colourful parked two-wheelers; workmen slotting chiselled cobblestones into gaping holes in the road.

And the morning is when you see the cats being fed.

There is an unfeasible number of cats at large in the Eternal City. And they are tended to by a long-established army of cat feeders, mainly women.

Early in the morning, the gattare - cat ladies - can be seen on street corners, among the ruins and gravestones, tenderly dishing up plates of chopped spaghetti with turkey bits or emptying catfood on to china plates.

The cat ladies are part of the city. They range from the elegant diplomat's wife type to housewives, animal-loving expats, sentimental teenagers and lonely bag ladies.

Judging by the plump, glossy appearance of the average Roman stray cat (of which there are thought to be 200,000) there is no shortage of cat ladies.

These days they are providing far more than food. No Roman moggy would miss the de-fleaing, jabbing and mollycoddling on offer.

At Torre Argentina, the terminus of the number 8 tram, near the spot where Julius Caesar was stabbed by Brutus, hordes of stray cats lounge around among the remains of an ancient temple.

Here the cat ladies have become so organized they run a cat adoption website with mugshots of the cats on offer.

Across the city, in the shadow of the Pyramid of Caius Cestius, is the Protestant cemetery, where Keats and Shelley are buried. Here more cats gather, tails up, to meet Matilde Talli, who turns up every morning at 7.30 to look after her feline friends.

Thanks to donations from the Anglo-Italian Society for the Protection of Animals, the cats who live at the pyramid even have a shed full of lined baskets to ensure they sleep well. In the winter, steam rises from the shed's catflaps as all 80 huddle inside.

Cats are almost as sacred here as cows are in India.

The law of Lazio, the region around Rome, gives stray cats the right to stay wherever they are born.

Stray cats are protected as "biocultural heritage" and Romans are obliged to make sure they are fed and given medical assistance.

Cats cannot be put down - unless they have incurable diseases or are in pain - but they can be neutered or spayed. The local government provides the service for free, and regular check-ups thereafter.-Dawn/The Guardian News Service.