In 1768, Captain Cook returned from Oceania with a crew covered in tattoos as souvenirs of his expedition. The tattoo was then reintroduced to the Western world after being banned for many centuries by the Catholic Church. However, the history of the tattoo does not end there. The oldest mummy in the world is covered in these marks and it is not the only one.
otzi
A man from the bronze age died five thousand years ago and his body was imprisoned in the ice of the mountains that separate Austria and Italy. We found over 50 tattoos on his body which consisted mainly of lines and crosses. Those marks have been made by rubbing charcoal into fine wounds. The reason behind those tattoos was probably therapeutic as their locations correspond to body parts affected by arthritis.
amunet
Amunet was an Egyptian priestess of the goddess Hathor at Thebes and was probably a concubine of King Mentuhotep II. She lived during the 9th dynasty (around 2150-1990 BC) and her body was covered in tattoos resembling those of the brides of the dead (small figurines placed in the tombs of male mummies). The most particular ones were located in the lower part of her belly and were accompanied by scarifications. These marks were probably related to an idea of fertility and were found on many ballerina mummies. Here are some interesting facts:
1. Of all the Egyptian mummies found to this day, only those of women were tattooed.
2. The first figurative tattoo that was made represented Bes, the god of revelry and master of ceremonies in orgies.
Chief Pazyryk
In the Altai mountains of Siberia, near the borders of Mongolia and China, a tomb of a nomadic horseman chief who lived around 500 BC was found. Rain flooded the tomb shortly after the burial and, by freezing, preserved the chief’s tattooed skin. Animals (mythical and real) were the main subjects of his tattoos. We believe that those were made by the insertion of small needles that are also used for embroidery. But what is most surprising are the small circles on his back that match the linear markings on Otzi’s back. The tattoos correspond to acupuncture marks, which are said to have originated in China two thousand years ago…
Other tattooed mummies have been found around the world, such as in Libya and Peru, showing that tattoos have a much more complex history than we are generally led to believe.