Everyday Things: Tattoos
More and more people are having tattoos these days for a great many reasons: for spiritual purposes, to remember kids or friends, to show solidarity to a military group or football team - whatever your reason, it's always a personal one. But where did this body painting all start?
It is claimed that the art of tattooing has been around for over 14,000 years. They certainly date back a long way, Ötzi the 5,000 year old ice man found high up in the Italian/Austrian border had 57 tattoos on his body, probably applied as a treatment for his arthritis.
The word tattoo comes from the Tahitian world “tatu” meaning “to mark something”. Originally, the purpose of this method of body marking varied according to the culture. In Borneo, women had their particular skills tattooed on their arm to increase their marriage value; women in western Asia used tattoos to show social status, Dayak warriors tattooed their hands to gain respect and the Maoris of New Zealand developed a facial tattoo called Moko which is still used today. In many countries, tattoos around the wrist were thought to ward off illness and evil.
Despite earlier claims, among the first recorded tattoos in history were from Egypt at the time of the pyramids - the mummified remains of priestess Amunet were found with several dots and lines on her face and body. The Egyptians spread there art to other civilisations and before long Persia, Greece, Arabia and China were trying their hand at tattooing. The Greeks used tattoos to distinguish their spies; Romans used them to mark their criminals.
In Britain, early Saxons used them in ceremonies, often having the family crest marked on their bodies. However, not all were in favour and after the Norman invasion in 1066 tattoos were banned, hated by the governing French, and not seen again in the West until the 16th century. Meanwhile, in the East, they were flourishing - becoming increasingly popular in Japan, but not for the same reasons. Over there, they were again used to mark criminals - first offenders getting a line on their foreheads, a second offence added an arch, the third another line - which spelled the word ‘dog’. This could also be the origin of the “three chances and you’re out” idea. Before long it started to become popular in normal society in Japan, as even royalty had elaborate tattoos.
While Captain Cook was trawling about in the South Pacific in the late 1700s, he brought back a heavily tattooed Polynesian called Omai. He was an instant hit attracting people from miles around to view his body painting - soon, the upper-classes were all following suit with tattoos of their own. It may have swept the nation, but the main barrier to this was the way they were made. Firstly, every puncture of the skin was done by hand, the ink added at the same time. Things got a little easier when Samuel O’Reilly patented the first electric tattooing machine in 1891 and suddenly tattoos were readily available to anyone at reasonable cost. His basic design included moving coils, an ink tube and a needle - the same items found in today’s tattoo guns. A motor pushes the needle into the skin at a rate of about 3,000 punctures per minute, inserting a tiny drop of ink 1/8 of an inch under the skin each time.
Everything changed again in the early 1920s when tattoos became seen as freakish. Travelling circuses of the time featured heavily tattooed men and women as exhibits to peer at. And so the art of tattooing went underground, with those getting it done keeping it quiet.
During World War I tattoos were associated with the military - used almost like passports to show where people had been stationed. After World War II tattoos were associated with bikers, sailors, drunkards and delinquents. This view was not helped by a bout of hepatitis and other diseases in the USA in the ‘60s which made people much more aware of the dangers of tattooing. Suddenly tattoo parlours received bad press and everything had to be sterilised under new rules. With regulation in place, tattoos slowly made a comeback, and today there is a whole new attitude to them as a fashion symbol. It is now seen as a fine art, with tattooists famous for their enterprising designs and phenomenal artwork.
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