Decoration, status symbol or proof of religious conviction, tattoos have always been a powerful form of expression throughout the ages.
A publication of the Archaeological Institute of America, the magazine "Archeology" in its new issue collected several key examples of ancient tattoos, from Romania and Italy, through Japan and Egypt to Oceania and America. In the early 1980s, more than 20 lavishly decorated ceramic figurines were found in northeastern Romania.
They were made by a people known today as the Kukuteni culture, which flourished in the period of present-day Romania and Ukraine from 4800 to 3000 BC.
Many experts believe that tattoos are lavish decorations.
"Some say it's clothing or something we don't understand. What's important is that they used the surface of the body to convey ideas, whether they were related to group or individual identity," says University of San Francisco archaeologist Douglas W. Bailey.
He recalled that earlier Paleolithic figures such as the Venus of Willendorf had no decorations and that decorations appeared only in the Neolithic on ceramic vessels.
"If the vessel is a metaphor for the body, then the process of decoration can be seen as tattooing," he said, adding that it is possible that with the decoration of ceramics, people began to apply similar decorations to the body.
Perhaps the most famous tattooed ancient man is the Iceman Eci who died in the Italian Alps over 5.000 years ago. Eci is covered in more than 50 tattoos from lines and dots to crosses.
Archaeologists believe that tattoos were used as a medicine because they are found on the parts of the body that are most "worn" by time - ankles, knees, cross... It should be mentioned that until Etzi it was believed that acupuncture as a way of treating painful joints appeared in Asia more than 2.000 years later.
Egypt is interesting for the history of tattoos because in this culture this form of body decoration was reserved for women. Over the years, archaeologists have found several examples of tetorivar women, but the most evidence is ceramic vessels and figurines that were left in houses as votive gifts or in tombs.
It is believed that tattoos were associated with female sexuality, fertility, and in the New Kingdom women, especially musicians and dancers, had tattooed depictions of the dwarf deity Bes, who was the protector of women in childbirth and women in general, on their thighs.
In the 1870s, the Japanese government banned the Ainu people from decorating their bodies, even though this small indigenous group was known for elaborate facial and arm tattoos.
Many experts believe that the Ainu were the last custodians of a tradition that dates back to the time of the Jomon, hunter-gatherers who developed a complex culture that lasted from 12000 to 300 BC.
Archaeologists who dealt with this culture found numerous human-shaped figurines with rich decoration on the face and body. Captain Cook was the first to use the verb "tattooing" in the English language when describing the Tahitian art of tatau in his journal.
Now, people all over the world have Polynesian-inspired tattoos, but the first to wear them were the Lapita, a people who lived from 1.500 to 500 BC and who were the ancestors of today's Pacific peoples.
There is no direct evidence that the Lapitas tattooed themselves, but archaeologists have found pottery with motifs that are very similar to today's tattoos - tribal.
In ancient Greece and Rome, tattoos were generally seen as a sign of punishment or shame. Herodotus writes that the Greeks came up with the idea of using tattoos as a form of punishment after looking at the Persians, who in the sixth century BC used this to mark criminals, slaves and enemies.
A similar principle was applied by the Romans, however, among the cultures and peoples they encountered - Thracians, Scythians, Gauls, Picts, Celts - tattoos were marks of pride, especially among the Thracians, where they represented a sign of high birth.
The Moche culture of ancient Peru is known for its lavishly decorated ceramic vessels, gold jewelry and fabrics, as well as decorated people. Archaeologists dealing with this mysterious culture have found numerous evidences that tattooing was common in this culture.
Moche shamans had animals tattooed, probably to indicate their ability to change shape in trance. Animals, both real and imagined, decorate the body of the Lady of Cao, a well-preserved mummy found in El Bruh in 2005.
Her body is decorated with stylized catfish, spiders, crabs, cats, snakes and the mythical Moon Animal. Most animals are associated with fertility, rain, deities...
For more than 1000 years in the Mexican states of Jalisco, Najarit, and Colima, a culture flourished that is best known from artifacts found in tombs, including richly "tattooed" ceramic figures.
Some believe these figurines represent gods, but Christopher Beekman of the University of Colorado Denver believes they are actually people buried in tombs.
Here, tattoos represent a status symbol and figurines were used in a ceremonial context. It is also interesting that the most prominent tattoos are around the mouth, which may indicate that they are skilled speakers.
From 1200 to 1600, North American Indians spoke many different languages and lived in the vast expanses of today's USA, but they had similar religious rituals that are now called the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex.
David Dye of the University of Memphis, who has studied Native American rituals, says tattooing was a vital part of these shared religious ideas.
"For warriors, facial tattoos represented the souls of those they killed in battle. They not only extended their lives but also the lives of their relatives," he says.
Most evidence of Native American tattooing comes from ceramic vessels in the shape of human heads with tattoos around the eyes and on the cheeks. The motifs are most often birds because of the Bird Man, a deity who represented the triumph of life over death.
The indigenous people known as the Ibaloi used to mummify their dead and bury them in caves in what is now the Philippine area of Kabayan. While they were alive, these people had lavish tattoos in the form of geometric shapes, but also lizards, snakes, and scorpions.
(PHOTO: liverpoolecho.co.uk)
For the Ibalo warriors, these creatures represented a kind of totem or "sign". If he saw an animal before a battle and then triumphed in it, the warrior would then tattoo it.
It is interesting that their descendants still wear similar Ibaloi motifs on their skin today, done in a traditional way that almost disappeared forever.
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