What function did these tattoos serve? Who got them and why?īecause this seemed to be an exclusively female practice in ancient Egypt, mummies found with tattoos were usually dismissed by the (male) excavators who seemed to assume the women were of "dubious status," described in some cases as "dancing girls." The female mummies had nevertheless been buried at Deir el-Bahari (opposite modern Luxor) in an area associated with royal and elite burials, and we know that at least one of the women described as "probably a royal concubine" was actually a high-status priestess named Amunet, as revealed by her funerary inscriptions.Īnd although it has long been assumed that such tattoos were the mark of prostitutes or were meant to protect the women against sexually transmitted diseases, I personally believe that the tattooing of ancient Egyptian women had a therapeutic role and functioned as a permanent form of amulet during the very difficult time of pregnancy and birth. to several later examples of female mummies with these forms of permanent marks found in Greco-Roman burials at Akhmim. And then, of course, there are the mummies with tattoos, from the three women already mentioned and dated to c. Also small bronze implements identified as tattooing tools were discovered at the town site of Gurob in northern Egypt and dated to c. 1300 B.C., all with tattoos on their thighs. to occasional female figures represented in tomb scenes c. There's certainly evidence that women had tattoos on their bodies and limbs from figurines c. What is the evidence that ancient Egyptians had tattoos? This would also explain their somewhat 'random' distribution in areas of the body which would not have been that easy to display had they been applied as a form of status marker.
But following the more recent discovery of the Iceman from the area of the Italian-Austrian border in 1991 and his tattoo patterns, this date has been pushed back a further thousand years when he was carbon-dated at around 5,200 years old.Ĭan you describe the tattoos on the Iceman and their significance?įollowing discussions with my colleague Professor Don Brothwell of the University of York, one of the specialists who examined him, the distribution of the tattooed dots and small crosses on his lower spine and right knee and ankle joints correspond to areas of strain-induced degeneration, with the suggestion that they may have been applied to alleviate joint pain and were therefore essentially therapeutic. In terms of tattoos on actual bodies, the earliest known examples were for a long time Egyptian and were present on several female mummies dated to c. What is the earliest evidence of tattoos? Joann Fletcher, research fellow in the department of archaeology at the University of York in Britain, describes the history of tattoos and their cultural significance to people around the world, from the famous " Iceman," a 5,200-year-old frozen mummy, to today’s Maori. These permanent designs-sometimes plain, sometimes elaborate, always personal-have served as amulets, status symbols, declarations of love, signs of religious beliefs, adornments and even forms of punishment. Humans have marked their bodies with tattoos for thousands of years.
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