Executive Review

The objective of this paper is to provide an effectual illustration in regard to the history of tattoos and tattooing.

Introduction

Social deviance continues to be quite significant within modern day society and one of the more significant occurrences that appears to confirm this is that of tattooing, a concept that has been in existence throughout the centuries, ‘beginning as early as Ancient Egypt around 2000 B.C.’ (Essortment, 2005)

Tattoos, Tattooing & the relatively historic characteristics of the art

Within modern day society, however, while tattoos were initially associated exclusively with behavior that was rated as deviant at the very least, this is something that has been rapidly changing. ‘Once associated only with gangs, tattoos are done between friends sharing common bonds and by individuals expressing their own uniqueness’ (Essortment, 2005). Moreover, people of all ages and racial backgrounds have contemporarily taken to tattooing as one of the most subtly effectual means to expressing their individual views regarding such things as diversely removed from one another as society, sex, gender, race, culture, technology and religion. Moreover, in addition to this, while the occurrence of tattooing is documented to have been in existence as early as the civilization of ancient Egypt as a result of having discovered mummies that indicate evidence of the familiar tattooing line and dot patterns on their bodies, it actually goes far beyond even that era.

This is something that is made exceptionally clearer when acknowledging that the word itself, ‘tattoo’ actually comes from the Tahitian term ‘tatu’ which means ‘to mark something’ (Dark Angel Tattoo Studio, 2005). And while it currently symbolizes, at the very most, a signature of individuality in terms of expressionism, it would be relevant to acknowledge that in history, tattooing was fundamentally an offshoot of ritualistic and traditionalist influences. This is something that emphasized upon quite strongly when acknowledging that in the distant past it was quite common for women to express their specific domestic and other skills in as much as getting a respectively expressive tattoo on their arms. This was considered advantageous as it was instrumental in as much proverbially professing their merits out loud and subsequently, increasing their potential for marriage based on merit.

More on the historic implementation of tattoos and tattooing

Furthermore, even currently, a few groups or religions consider a respective tattoo to be ‘an integral part of their religion and each person following the religion is required to have that tattoo mark on their body symbolizing the person authority as a group member’ (Tattoos By Design, 2005). In addition to this, some cultures also superstitiously believed that tattoos on particular parts of the anatomy were effective with regard to warding off such things as illness and bad luck (Tattoo You, 2005). This, however, as becomes evident when considering reasons for which tattoos were used in the various different civilizations of the ancient world, was only one of the more general implementations of the art of tattooing. Take into consideration, for instance, the manner in which tattooing was put to use, respectively and particularly, by the ancient Greeks, Romans and Asians.

While ancient Greeks used tattoos to mark spies in order to avoid breaches of their national security repeatedly, the Romans used tattoos in order to publicly demarcate and humiliate slaves and criminals. On the other hand, while the Ainu people of ancient western Asia used tattooing as a form of marking societal status, they are believed to ‘have carried the art to Japan where is became a mark of religion’ (Dark Angel Tattoo Studio, 2005). Similar to the Ainu, while the Polynesians of the era were also known to use tattoos in order to denote societal status, they are considered to be instrumental with regards to the globalization of tattooing in as much as carrying the art to New Zealand.

The gradual and eventual evolution of the art of tattooing – Back to the West

Gradually, while 787 AD saw the practice of the art of tattooing being banned towards the West, the art of tattooing became increasingly significant towards the east, specifically with regard to Japan. Indeed, Japan can be said to be the epicenter of the evolution of tattooing from merely an unusual form of art into a full blown, actual profession. Somewhere towards the earlier portion of the 18th century [or what was known as the Edo period in Japan] woodblock art was a significantly prolific form of art in Japan. Gradually however, as people of all classes and societal strata came to grow increasingly entranced by the art of tattooing, it was the woodblock artists who ‘exchanged their wood-carving blades for long, sharp needles using sharp needles used to insert pressed charcoal ink under their skin’ (Kunihiro, 2005).

While Japan was clearly reveling increasingly in the form of tattooing as a form of personal expression that was also akin to attitude and art, the stance of the west in regard to tattooing was growing increasingly negative. Once thought to be novelties, a large portion of the 19th century saw the west viewing tattoos as barely more than deviances that were oddities meant for freaks. This, however, was something that changed rather abruptly in early 70’s with the arrival, in the west, of an individual widely referred to as Sailor Jerry. Strongly influenced by Asian art and tattooing in particularly, he was taken up with the potential of merging the exoticness of Asian tattooing ‘with contemporary western styles and with a greater range of pigment, and in this way he expanded the repertoire of images he used for tattoo designs’ (Gilbert, 2000).

Conclusion

While all that has been said and discussed is quite relevant to the history of tattooing, the paper would be rather incomplete without conclusively considering the part that Samuel O'Reilly, the man credited with the invention of the tattoo machine that continues to be used today. Centralized around a needle that is hollowed out so as to accommodate the permanent ink used for printing on skin, commercially used tattoo machines use an electric motor that pushes the needle in and out of the skin at a rate of up to 3000 punctures per minute. With each puncture, the needle inserts a small drop of ink about 1/8 of an inch below the surface of the skin. This is relevant as it thus attains within a few hours the eventual effect that was anciently achieved sometimes over a period of days (Bellis, 2005).

Tattoos Bibliography

Online Resources/ Web Pages:

• Essortment (2005). The history of tattoos and their meaning today. Accessed on December 05, 2005 @ http://riri.essortment.com/historyoftatto_rjoy.htm
• Dark Angel Tattoo Studio (2005). The History of Tattooing. Accessed on December 05, 2005 @ http://www.darkangeltattoos.com/care.php
• Tattoo You (2005). A Brief History of Tattoos. Accessed on December 05, 2005 @ http://www.powerverbs.com/tattooyou/history.htm
• Tattoos by Design (2005). History of Tattoos. Accessed online on December 05, 2005 @ http://www.tattoos-by-design.co.uk/history.html

Articles & Books

• Kunihiro, S (2005). Brief History of the Japanese Tattoo - The Japan Tattoo Institute Accessed online on December 05, 2005 @ http://www.keibunsha.com/hst_jt.html
• Bellis, M. (2005) Samuel O'Reilly - History of Tattoo Machines. Accessed online on December 05, 2005 @ http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bltattoomachine.htm
• Gilbert, Steve (2000) Tattoo History: A Source Book. Juno Books.

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