Prehistoric Tattoos Before Time: Prehistoric Tattoo Designs

Monday 09th of February 2009 04:24:57 PM [Add To This Article]

The tribal tattoo, which has become very popular in the last few years, is often considered to be the primitive rendition of a timeless art form. However, tribal tattoos are absolutely modern when compared with the truly ancient specimens: prehistoric tattoo designs. These designs have been found on mummies over 7000 years old and of every ethnic group imaginable, and it appears that man began marking himself and his possessions with this ancient art form long before he began to focus on fire or the wheel. Prehistoric tattoos were probably created by scoring the flesh with a knife. Sound painful? If so, you probably would not have enjoyed the next part of the process either: rubbing ashes or dark colors of mud into the wounds so that the skin would heal over the knife lines and seal in the design. These tattoos were used for a variety of purposes, including passage to manhood and as an indicator for a woman’s fertility. If a man could not take the pain of a tattoo, then he would likely be unreliable as a provider for a family or as a hunting or battle companion. Similarly, if a girl could not handle the tattooing process, it did not bode well for her birthing capabilities because childbirth would definitely be more painful than a tattoo.

Tattoos were not just a rite of passage for prehistoric man, however. Many historians believe that the nature of the tattoos indicates a great deal about their purpose. The oldest mummies, such as the extremely artistic Otzi, “the iceman,” who was pulled out of a glacier and is believed to date back to about 3300 B.C., tend to have prehistoric tattoo designs that are largely linear. Otzi himself had more tattoos than any other mummy to date, with his total coming to 57 distinct tattoos. Nearly all of them are entirely linear. This may have been largely due to necessity since carving oneself up with a knife does not necessarily lend itself to highly detailed work, but as many who work in traditional tattoo arts know, you can do a lot with a sharp bone and some form of ink. As a result, most scientists think that the linear designs were not necessarily simple lines just because that was the best that the artist could do, but more likely because there were additional reasons that the artist sought to follow and mimic the lines of the body. These prehistoric tattoos were likely therapeutic in nature, and designed to fortify the bone structure of the individual or ward of pains like rheumatism and arthritis, which could attack a prehistoric human at ages as young as fifteen due to hard living, malnutrition and a harsh environment. Just as today we use tattoos to express our individuality and our personal beliefs or “story,” prehistoric man probably also used these unique markings to make a statement. Even today, certain indigenous tribes that have been untouched – or nearly untouched – by the modern world engage in time-honored marking traditions that are designed to help them identify their strengths and their loved ones in this world and the next.

Interestingly, these tattoos are often quite similar to the marks that the same tribes place on their livestock, providing further support for the idea that these markings have to do with identification and group belonging. Scientists hypothesize that the more elaborate prehistoric tattoos found on mummies slightly “younger” than Otzi indicate an evolution of tattoo belief. Whereas once it was largely medicinal and even practical, prehistoric tattooing was beginning to take on a life of its own, becoming a way to discover more about oneself and one’s strengths and story. For example, an elaborately tattooed mummy thought to be a chief displayed a virtual menagerie of animals and monsters that were intricate and characterized by curved lines and swirls. This mummy was not enough younger than Otzi for the tattooing process to be any different, but clearly the intent of the tattoos was. Researchers think that this chief may have relied on the power of the animals and monsters to give him strength, and that the markings may also have designated him as an important man in the afterlife. Other mummies from this time display similar, but fewer tattoos, indicating that the ideas behind the tattoos were not restricted to the heads of the clan alone, but that everyone engaged in this tattoo-supported belief system to some extent.

Of course, there would have been a number of pitfalls involved in prehistoric tattooing. The most serious would have been infection, since there would have been no way to effectively sterilize the knife used to carve the tattoo design into the flesh, and rubbing mud or ashes in the resulting wound could only have exacerbated the pain and prolonged the healing process. Researchers who have replicated the process today have also found that if the wound is not deep enough, the body may expel the marking substance during the healing process, which could mean that the carving would have to be repeated multiple times in order to achieve the desired effect. In many ways, prehistoric tattooing is destined to remain a mystery. While we can certainly empathize with prehistoric man’s desire to set himself apart or identify himself to his loved ones in the long afterlife that followed his extremely short time on earth, we cannot ever fully know what the tattoos meant to the man or woman whose mummy still bears them. However, the fact that Otzi still bears his 57 tattoos with pride nearly 5000 years after he froze to death does give a new sense of permanence to this incredibly intimate art. While we may not know exactly what the Otzi’s story was, it is clear that this man had strong beliefs and an incredible spirit that lead him to mark himself in a way that would identify him as an individual and, in some ways, a legend forever. Prehistoric tattoo designs may always be a mystery, but they lend new credence and timelessness to every modern tattoo design and the individual behind it.

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