MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

Europeans “discovered” tattooing practices in much the same manner that Columbus “discovered” the New World. Lands were colonized and bodies were ritually decorated centuries before explorers made contact with indigenous cultures. Explorers viewed tattoos as body decoration, but to indigenous peoples body art was a spiritual practice. Tattoos delineated aspects of identity, including age, social status, and emotional state. Tattoo symbols frequently denoted relationships such as friends, family members, death of a relative, even how the relative died. For females, tattoos often indicated fertility and marriageability. Eighteenth-century naturalists who accompanied explorers were fascinated by oriental cultures, and they thoroughly documented indigenous practices. Many sailors visiting foreign ports adopted these cultural traditions,especially tattooing. Some European sailors embraced tattooing in order to assimilate with the indigenous population, in particular to sexually access females who would not associate with non-tattooed males. Although their status remained relatively low in their countries of origin, sailors became cultural ambassadors through the dissemination of information that could be accessed by the public: their skin. My paper will explore the history and tradition of tattooing by indigenous peoples and the appropriation of this practice by sailors from the eighteenth century onward. Inherent in tattooing are aspects of identification, agency, and ritual, components of which were incorporated and sometimes redefined by the sailors who embraced body art.