Today tattoos are becoming a popular phenomenon that is seen everywhere. They come in all shapes and sizes and can appear almost anywhere on someone’s body. There are usually many different reasons why people today, and especially teenagers, are getting permanent tattoos but probably, one of the commonest among these is their desire to appear trendy and to show themselves different from all the others around them.

What do we know about the origin of tattoos?

Some scientists claim that tattoos date from about 3300 BC. They say that an evidence for this are certain marks found on the skin of the Iceman, a mummified human body. Such marks, which resembled modern tattoos, were also observed on Egyptian and Nubian mummies (dating from about 2000 BC) and some classical authors also mention the use of tattoos in connection with Greeks, ancient Germans, Gauls, Thracians and ancient Britons.

The word tattoo comes from the Thaitian word ‘tattau’ and means ‘to mark’. It was first mentioned in explorer James Cook’s records from his 1769 expedition to the South Pacific. Because tattoos were considered so exotic in Europe and the USA, the practice of tattooing quickly spread on these continents and later throughout the 19th and 20th century it was already becoming more and more popular among people all over the world. What are some of the special meanings of tattoos in different cultures?

Tattoos usually have different meaning and symbolize different things in different cultures and societies. At first, in early practice, the most common motive for tattooing was decoration, which actually still remains to be one of the chief reasons for modern tattooing. However, in some cultures tattoos can have other different meanings as well. In the past, some of them served as identification of the wearer’s rank or status in a group. For example, the early Romans tended to tattoo slaves and criminals. Other tattoos, such as the Thaitian, served as rites of a passage and they could tell the history of one’ s life. For example, in certain societies, boys received one tattoo when they reached manhood while men had another style done when they married. What do we know about the different tattoo methods?

There is a big variety of tattoo methods in different cultures. For example, in North and South America , many Indian tribes tattooed their bodies or faces by simple pricking, and some tribes in California introduced color into scratches. Tribes of the Arctic and Subarctic (mostly Inuit) and some people in eastern Siberia made needle punctures through which a thread-coated pigment was drawn underneath the skin. In Polynesia and Micronesia pigment was pricked into the skin by tapping on a tool shaped like a small rake.

As far as modern tattooing is concerned, today most tattoos are created by injecting ink into the skin. Injection is done by a needle attached to a hand-held tool. The tool moves the needle up and down at a rate of several hundred vibrations per minute and penetrates the skin by about one millimetre. Thus the ink intermingles with the stable cells of the dermis and creates the picture of the tattoo, which is to last for your entire life. Can tattooing be dangerous?

Today many people who decide to have a tattoo made on their body often forget to consider the importance of this question, believing that tattoos are completely harmless for them. However it turns out that they are not right because, no matter how impossible it may seem, tattoos do hide dangers for their health. For example, tattooing can often become the reason for the transmission of some serious diseases such as hepatitis, tuberculosis and possibly HIV due to the use of non-sterile tattooing practices or inadequate methods of sterilization.

In addition to the infections that can occur if proper care is not taken after the tattooing session, allergic reactions are also possible as none of the 50-plus colors and shades of pigment used in tattooing today are medically checked or regulated.

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