Draft:Indigenous tattoo practices

Traditional tattooing practices vary greatly across the world.

Africa

Traditional tattooing practices existed among the Malagasy of Madagascar, but had largely lost favor by the 1950s. Other African ethnic groups with traditional tattooing practices include the Afar and Menit, Fang, Fula, Makonde, and Yoruba

Berbers

Berber communities in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia practice tattooing on the arms, hands, face, neck, and collarbones. It is thought the tradition in these communities goes back several thousand years. Tattoos serve multiple purposes, including decoration, tribal affiliation, symbols of life transitions, and medicinal and fertility purposes. The practice is mainly limited to women, although some men receive tattoos for healing or medicinal purposes; these tattoos tend to be smaller and more discreet. Traditionally, girls would receive their first facial tattoo at puberty.Symbols used include the yaz, representing freedom, nature symbols like suns, animals, and plants, and geometric symbols like lines, dots, triangles, circles, half circles, and diamonds.

The tradition has declined due to the influence of Islam, in which tattooing is forbidden, and specifically a wave of stricter Salafism in North Africa in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Berber tattoo artists both in North Africa and in the diaspora are continuing the practice.

Tigray woman from Ethiopia with a Coptic cross tattoo

Copts

Coptic tattoos often consist of three lines, three dots and two elements, reflecting the Trinity. The tools used had an odd number of needles to bring luck and good fortune. Many Copts have the Coptic cross tattooed on the inside of their right arm. This may have been influenced by a similar practice tattooing religious symbols on the wrists and arms during the Ptolemaic period.

Asia

Bedouin Arabs

16th century Ottoman scholars described the tattoo as very common among the Arabs. Tattoos among Bedouins have long been documented and continue until the present, especially among women. The tattoos are usually done at home by other women, and symbolize personal milestones and community history and identification. The tattoos are often made by indentation and insertion of indigo dye on the face, ankles, wrists and other body parts. They are also considered to ward of the evil eye and forces, and protect the person, with some attributing healing and medical properties, similar to Ancient Egypt.

Kurds

Main article: Deq (tattoo)

Traditional Kurdish tattoos are called deq. Facial tattoos are popular among the Kurdish people in Iraq, Turkey, Syria and Iran, mostly in the form of dotted tattoos on the chin. They are most common among women aged 60 and above. Younger women often have more minimalist tattoos, such as a dot on the cheek or chin. These tattoos are often done at home with a sewing needle and soot filled into the puncture. Many of the tattos depict symbols from nature, such as plants, animals and stars. Tattoos between the eye are meant to protect from the evil eye.

Europe

Traditional tattooing practices in Europe include sicanje (Roman Catholic Croats).

North America

A number of indigenous nations in North America historically and currently practiced tattooing. These tattoo practices include tavlugun (Inupiaq), yidiiltoo (Hän Gwich’in).

Yupik

Inuit

Main article: Kakiniit

Inuit women and their children on King's Island, Canada, 1910. Tattoos on arms and chins.

The Inuit have a deep history of tattooing. In Inuktitut, the Inuit language of the eastern Canadian Arctic, the word kakiniit translates to the English word for tattoo and the word tunniit means face tattoo. Among the Inuit, some tattooed female faces and parts of the body symbolize a girl transitioning into a woman, coinciding with the start of her first menstrual cycle. A tattoo represented a woman's beauty, strength, and maturity. This was an important practice because some Inuit believed that a woman could not transition into the spirit world without tattoos on her skin.The Inuit have oral traditions that describe how the raven and the loon tattooed each other giving cultural significance to both the act of tattooing and the role of those animals in Inuit culture and history. European missionaries colonized the Inuit in the beginning of the 20th century and associated tattooing as an evil practice "demonizing" anyone who valued tattoos.

Alethea Arnaquq-Baril has helped Inuit women to revitalize the practice of traditional face tattoos through the creation of the documentary Tunniit: Retracing the Lines of Inuit Tattoos, where she interviews elders from different communities asking them to recall their own elders and the history of tattoos. The elders were able to recall the traditional practice of tattooing which often included using a needle and thread and sewing the tattoo into the skin by dipping the thread in soot or seal oil, or through skin poking using a sharp needle point and dipping it into soot or seal oil. Hovak Johnston has worked with the elders in her community to bring the tradition of kakiniit back by learning the traditional ways of tattooing and using her skills to tattoo others.

Painting of an Inuit woman with tattoos on her face

Oceania

Traditional tattoo practices in Oceania include batok (the Philippines), malu and peʻa (Samoa), Rapa Nui tattooing (Rapa Nui), tā moko (Aotearoa/New Zealand), and tatu (Marquesas Islands).

Melanesia

Traditionally, Melanesian tattoos were primarily for women, as seen in the Fijian traditional of veiqia. Women from Papua New Guinea received geometric tattoos across the body.

Micronesia

In Micronesia, tattooing done on both men and women, and was primarily done on the torso, arms, and legs. Women's tattoos were tied to marriage and childbearing. Common designs were frigate birds, dolphins and sharks, stripes, and arches on the back (seen mainly in Yap).