Zurich Studies

in Archaeology
Vol. 9_2013

Tattoos and
Body Modifications
in Antiquity
Proceedings of the sessions at the EAA annual
meetings in The Hague and Oslo, 2010/11

edited by
Philippe Della Casa
Constanze Witt
Portrait of George Tihoti
Tihoti the tattooist came to Huahine from the Marquesas Islands
and his personal tattoos as well as his tattoo designs in his prac-
tice are traditional designs from the Marquesan archipelago. This
portrait shows him in his normal daily dress at that time, and with
a pareo wrapped around his waist.

Photo by Phillip Hofstetter, California State University, East Bay.

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Herausgeber
Universität Zürich
Abt. Ur- und Frühgeschichte
Karl-Schmid-Str. 4, CH 8006 Zürich
www.prehist.uzh.ch
Produktion 
Chronos Verlag
Design & Layout 
Elisabeth Hefti, Juliet Manning
Druck
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© Texte: Autor/innen
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ISBN x-xxxx-xxxx-x
Table of Contents
5 Aspects of Embodiment – Tattoos and Body Modifications in Antiquity
Philippe Della Casa & Constanze Witt

9 Matters of Identity: Body, Dress and Markers in Social Context

Philippe Della Casa

15 The Material Culture and Middle Stone Age Origins of Ancient Tattooing
Aaron Deter-Wolf

27 The Power to Cure: A Brief History of Therapeutic Tattooing

Lars Krutak

35 Flint, Bone, and Thorns: Using Ethnohistorical Data, Experimental Archaeology,

and Microscopy to Examine Ancient Tattooing in Eastern North America
Aaron Deter-Wolf & Tanya M. Peres

49 Body Modification at Paracas Necropolis, South Coast of Peru, ca. 2000 BP

Elsa Tomasto Cagigao, Ann Peters, Mellisa Lund & Alberto Ayarza

59 Interpreting the tattoos on a 700-year-old mummy from South America

Heather Gill-Frerking, Anna-Maria Begerock & Wilfried Rosendahl

67 Bronze Age Tattoos: Sympathetic Magic or Decoration?

Natalia. I. Shishlina, E. V. Belkevich & A. N. Usachuk

75 One More Culture with Ancient Tattoo Tradition in Southern Siberia:

Tattoos on a Mummy from the Oglakhty Burial Ground, 3rd-4th century AD
Svetlana V. Pankova

89 Tattoos from Mummies of the Pazyryk Culture

Karina Iwe

97 The Tattoo System in the Ancient Iranian World

Sergey A. Yatsenko

103 Intentional Cranial Deformation: Bioarchaeological Recognition of Social Identity

in Iron Age Sargat Culture
Svetlana Sharapova

115 Roman Cosmetics Revisited: Facial Modification and Identity

Rhiannon Y Orizaga

3
Philippe Della Casa & Constanze Witt (eds) Tattoos and Body Modifications in Antiquity. Proceedings of the sessions at the EAA annual meetings in
The Hague and Oslo, 2010/11. Zurich Studies in Archaeology vol. 9, 2013, 27-34.

personalized author's copy!

The Power to Cure:

A Brief History of Therapeutic Tattooing
Lars Krutak
Repatriation Office, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, MRC 138, P.O. Box 37012,
10th & Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, D.C. 20013, USA, krutakl@si.edu

For thousands of years, peoples around the world have practiced tattooing because of its perceived efficacy as a medi-
cinal therapy. As a form of medical treatment, tattoo thus exposed specific body locations where preventive, curative,
and spiritualistic medicine was practiced. Drawing on the palaeopathological record of tattooed mummies and ethno-
graphic research, this paper will explore the indelible legacy of therapeutic corporeal marking to reveal the complex
system of tools, techniques, and beliefs by which ancient and more recent cultures attempted to control their bodies,
lives, and experiences. Keywords: Tattooing, Medicinal Praxis, Indigenous Peoples, Mummies, Corporeality

1. Introduction
Throughout human history, ancient peoples of the world
developed techniques to maintain and restore health
through the prevention and treatment of illness. From trep-
anation to lancing, herbalism to acupuncture, prehistoric
medicinal practitioners incorporated a variety of philo-
sophical and practical solutions in their attempts to promote
the longevity and well-being of their clients in the face of
uncertain survival.
One of the least understood of these health care practi-
ces was therapeutic tattooing, or the insertion of permanent
colouring agents into the dermis to induce healing. Medi-
cinal tattooing took many forms, but the pigments employed
throughout time were remarkably similar (Krutak 2012,
148), indicating that they had perceived, if not real, curative
values.
In this paper I explore the relatively unstudied phe-
nomenon of therapeutic tattooing. For over five millennia,
if not longer, people across the globe have employed this
form of medicinal marking as a method to alleviate bodily
ills and pathological complaints; ailments that sometimes
were traced to the malevolent actions of spirits upon the
body. Drawing on the palaeopathological record of tattooed
mummies and ethnographic research in the Arctic (Krutak
1998ab; 1999; 2007; 2009), the Philippines (Krutak 2010), and
Sarawak, this survey documents the enduring cultural herit-
age of tattoo-puncture as a form of medical therapy.

2. Frozen in Ice: Ötzi

In 1991, a Neolithic “Iceman” some 5300 years old was dis-
covered in the Tyrolean Alps with tattoos preserved upon
his mummified skin. Later dubbed “Ötzi,” the Iceman’s tat-
toos are significant because they provide the earliest human
Figure 1. The 5300-year-old Iceman is the oldest known human to have
evidence of therapeutic tattooing in the world. Small linear worn medicinal tattoos akin to acupuncture. Redrawn after Spindler
incisions besmirched with bluish-black carbon pigments (1994, 172).

27

were placed at precise locations on the body correspond-
ing to major joint articulations. Radiographic analyses of the
Iceman’s corpse revealed considerable arthrosis in many of
the same regions (e.g. lower back or lumbar spine, hip joints,
knee joints, and ankle joints) where the tattoos were applied
(Zur Nedden & Wicke 1992). Coupled with the fact that 80%
of these tattoo positions correspond to classical acupuncture
points employed to treat rheumatic illness (Reuters 1998), it
seems very likely that these tattoo-punctures almost cer-
tainly had the purpose of relieving the degenerative effects
of Ötzi’s condition (Fig. 1).
It has been proposed that Ötzi’s indelible treatments
were repeated over time, because many of the Iceman’s
5300-year-old tattoos are exceedingly dark, suggesting mul-
tiple applications to the same loci (Dario Piombino-Mas-
cali, personal communication, 2010). One of these tattooed
regions (i.e. the lumbar spine) must have been punctured
by another individual, because the Iceman would not have
been able to reach it with precision. The Iceman also pos-
sessed two lines of tattooing around one of his wrists.
Other researchers have added to the list of Ötzi’s in-
delible medical therapeutics. Dorfer et al. (1999) indicated
that markings on the mummy’s back and right leg were
positioned on the gall bladder, spleen, liver, and stomach
acupuncture meridians. Meridians are specific pathways
that connect the internal organs with specific points that
are located either on the epidermis, often in close proximity
to nerves and blood vessels. The meridians and points cited
by Dorfer et al. (1999) are utilized by acupuncturists today
to treat abdominal disorders. Other recent scientific findings
revealed that the Iceman suffered from whipworms in his
colon (Aspöck et al. 1996). The discovery of a large amount of
charcoal in that organ probably demonstrated an attempt at
curing the malady through an oral dose (Oeggel 1998, cited
in Dorfer et al. 1999).
3. Shaman vs. Acupuncturist
Across the animistic world, the shaman’s role in medicinal
practice closely paralleled that of the Chinese acupuncturist.
Both were consulted to identify the causes of disease by dif-
ferentiation of symptoms and signs, to provide suitable treat-
ments. In acupuncture, pathogenic forces are thought to
28
Figure 2. Joint-tattooing of the St. Lawrence Island Yupiget. Drawing by
Mark Planisek, published in Krutak (2007, 153).
invade the human body from the exterior via the mouth,
nose or body surfaces and from there they travel along
specific pathways or meridians into the organ system. The
resultant maladies are called exogenous diseases. In circum-
polar cultures, the primary factor determining sickness was
the intrusion of an evil spirit from outside the body into one
of the “limb souls” or primary limb joints of the afflicted indi-
vidual (Krutak 1998a; 1999). These joints ultimately served as
the vehicular “highways” which malevolent entities travelled
to enter the human body and injure it. Consequently, and as
a form of spiritual-medicinal practice, indigenous peoples
like the Yupiget of St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, were tattooed
on specific joints with an apotropaic pigment comprised of
soot, urine, seal oil, and sometimes graphite to shut down
these pathways, especially after the death of a community
member, adversary, or large game animal (Fig. 2).
Up until the turn of the twentieth century, the Yupiget
characterized death as a dangerous time in which the liv-
ing could become possessed by the “shade” or malevolent
spirit of the deceased (Krutak 1998a, 32). A spirit of the dead
was believed to linger for some time in the vicinity of its for-
mer village and body. Though not visible to all, the shade
was conceived as an absolute material double of the corpse.
Because pallbearers were in direct contact with the recently
deceased, they were ritually tattooed at their primary joints
– shoulders, elbows, hip, wrist, knee, ankle, neck, and waist
– to repel the ethereal entity from causing a variety of sick-
nesses, including disordered behaviour, possession, fever,
convulsions, and severe rheumatism in the joints eventually
resulting in death (Krutak 1999).
Similarly, nearly every attribute of the human dead
was also believed to be equally characteristic of the ani-
mal dead, as the spirit of every animal was understood to
possess semi-human form. Men, and more rarely women,
were tattooed on St. Lawrence Island when they killed a seal,
polar bear, or harpooned a bowhead whale for the first time.
Like the tattoo of the pallbearer, “first-kill” tattoos (kakileq)
consisted of small dots that were stitched into the skin with
needle and sinew thread at the convergence of the primary
joints (Krutak 1998a, 34). The application of these tattoos im-
peded future instances of spirit possession and debilitating
arthrosis at these vulnerable passages.
When these findings are coupled with a reconstruc-
tion of a 2500-year-old mummy from the Pazyryk culture
of Siberia, excavated by Sergei Rudenko in 1947-48, evi-
dence for therapeutic tattooing becomes more compel-
ling. Rudenko found very fine needles in Pazyryrk burials,
and indicated that these implements may have been used
in Pazyryk therapeutic tattooing (Rudenko 1970, 112). This
Pazyryk “chief” bore dot-shaped tattoos on either side of the
lumbar spine and on the right ankle, locations that Krutak
(1998ab) first suggested were related to classical acupunc-
ture points utilized to relieve various ailments, like lumbago

and rheumatism. With regards to associated practices per-
formed on St. Lawrence Island, the location of the chief’s
tattoos directly correspond to those applied during Yupiget
funeral ceremonies and first-kill observations. Of course, the
Pazyryk chief’s joint tattoos closely parallel those seen on the
Iceman himself (Fig. 3).
Further analysis of traditional St. Lawrence Island tat-
too practices suggests that several tattooed areas on the
body outside of the primary limb joints directly overlapped
with classical acupuncture points (Krutak 1999, 233-242). In
the recent past, the Yupiget knew about these parallels. For
example, one elder explained that one of the areas tattoos
were placed upon coincides with the acupuncture point
yang pai – utilized to remedy frontal headache and pain
in the eye: “Grandparents, when they were pricking that
[point when they] hurt from headache, when [they] thought
that [the] eyes are bothering you[ …] they use acupuncture”
(Krutak 1999, 232). Of course, this remedy is quite ancient.
One of the earliest known references to acupuncture anal-
gesia of this kind is in a legend about Hua To (~A.D. 110-207),
the first-known Chinese surgeon, who used acupuncture for
headache (Chu 1979, 2).
The Aleuts or Unangan of the Aleutian Archipelago of
Alaska also utilized acupuncture in medical therapy to re-
lease “bad airs” (Marsh & Laughlin 1956, 40). Stone lancets
were used to pierce specific areas of the dermis, and this
therapy was resorted to in cases of headache, eye disor-
ders, colics, and lumbago (Marsh & Laughlin 1956). Like the
Yupiget, the Unangan tattoo-punctured to relieve aching
Figure 3 (left). The nomadic Pazyryk people ruled the Siberian steppes from
the sixth through the second centuries B.C. A 2500-year-old mummy of a
tribal chieftain sported elaborate zoomorphic and medicinal tattoos on his
spine and ankle that were probably applied to cure rheumatic complaints. Ar-
chaeological evidence supports that the Pazyryk probably employed methods
of skin-stitching and pricking to create their beautiful tattoos. Because Chi-
nese silk has been found in several Pazyryk burials, direct or indirect contact
occurred between the two cultures over two-thousand years ago. Redrawn
after Spindler (1994, 173).
Figure 4 (below). Ainu therapeutic tattoos that were incised into the skin
with a lancet. Redrawn after Kodama (1970, 123).
joints. The anthropologist Margaret Lantis (1984, 174) ob-
served that Atka Islanders “moistened thread covered with
gunpowder (probably soot in former times) sew[ing] through
the pinched-up skin near an aching joint or across the back
over a region of pain.”
Apparently, the efficacy of this potent medical technol-
ogy was very great because the Ainu of Japan also tattooed to
relieve rheumatism and sprains (Kodama 1970, 123-124) (Fig.
4), as did several indigenous California tribes like the Yuki
(Essene 1942, 59) and Miwok who employed the practice “for
the relief of rheumatic and chronic pains,” and the tattooing
“done immediately over the painful spot” with a pigment of
charred white sage (Artemesia ludoviciana) (Merriam 1966,
349; see also Barrett & Gifford 1933, 224). Interestingly, the
Ainu, Yuki, and Miwok similarly employed flint or obsidian
lancets to cut in these kinds of medicinal tattoos.
The Chippewa of the Great Lakes region of North
America also positioned tattoos over painful areas to cure
muscular pains, “such as rheumatism, dislocated joints,
and backache” (Hilger 1951, 93). They also tattooed to cure
goitre, as did the Kalinga and other indigenous peoples of
the Philippine Cordilleras who suffered from goitrous afflic-
tions (Jenks 1905, 189; Krutak 2010, 183, 220-221) (Fig. 5). The
Chippewa utilized wooden batons tipped with needles to
prick-in their medicinal tattoos, whereas the Kalinga hand-
tapped curative markings into the skin.
Kindred forms of indelible acupuncture-like therapy
have been documented in Canada and coastal Greenland.
For example, the Teetl’it Gwich’in of the Peel River employed
29

skin-stitched tattoos for facial paralysis that resulted from
stroke (Osgood 1936, 99). In Greenland, archaeological evi-
dence in the form of tattooed mummies indicates that facial
marking of a similar medicinal nature was part of the island’s
cultural history (Krutak 1999, 2009). Radiocarbon dated to the
fifteenth century A.D., the mummies of Qilakitsoq have re-
vealed that a conscious, exacting attempt was made to place
dot-motif tattoos at important facial points. Given that these
dot-motif tattoos are suggestive of acupuncture points, and
coupled with the fact that each actually designates a “clas-
sical acupuncture point”, cultural affinity must be suggested.
Besides, in the late nineteenth century Danish ethnographer
Gustav Holm (1914, 29) reported that Greenlanders “now and
then […] resort to tattooing in cases of sickness.” Although
we are not entirely certain if Holm was specifically refer-
ring to tattoo-puncture in his statement, several intriguing
1500-year-old ivory doll-heads excavated from St. Lawrence
30
Figure 5. Kalinga goiter tattooing.
Photograph Lars Krutak.
Island illustrate ancient continuity spanning thousands of
miles and hundreds of years (Krutak 2007, 172).
Outside of these related medicinal practices, it should
be noted that tattooing was documented in Native North
America as a treatment for a variety of other medical com-
plaints, including heart disease (Deg Hit’an), lack of mother’s
milk (Chugach Eskimo), consumption (Miwok), and tooth-
ache (Iroquois) (Barrett & Gifford 1933, 224; Birket-Smith
1953, 69; Lafitau 1977 [1724], 35; Osgood 1936, 73). But what
can be summarized from the previous discussion is that
Neolithic, Chinese, Yupiget, Pazyryk, Unangan, Ainu, Native
North American, Philippine Cordilleran, and Greenlandic
peoples believed that certain ailments of the body, whether
internal or external, were reflected at specific loci on the sur-
face of the skin or just below it. Thus, relieving excess pres-
sure at primary joints and specific dermic points enabled the
body to regain its former homeostasis or harmony within
Figure 6A-B. Tattoos found on the neck of a Chiribaya Alta mummy. Their alignment with
acupuncture points and meridians possibly indicates a medicinal function. Redrawn after
Spindler, published in Dorfer et al. (1999, 1024). Photograph courtesy J. Marvin Allison.
A B
and outside of itself. As one can imagine, then, it is believed
that there are many possible relationships and connections
between organs, points, joints, and tattoos.
4. Mummies from South American Sands
Hidden in shifting sands along the coastal valleys of south-
ern Peru and northern Chile, mummies by the thousands
have been discovered – some bearing intricate tattoos on
their desiccated skins. Of the many ancient cultures that in-
habited and tattooed in the region, the Chimú (A.D. 1100-
1470) were perhaps the most heavily and elaborately marked
of all. The exquisite designs tattooed into once living flesh,
and carved into silver, gold, and wooden burial objects, sug-
gests that the body’s integument was perceived as a kind of
double-sided garment that concealed and projected personal
power, prestige, and identity across the plane of the living
and the dead (Krutak 2007, 185).
Paleopathological studies of Chimú mummies indicate
that the practice of tattooing was quite common among both
males and females (Allison et al. 1981). In some coastal settle-
ments, it has been estimated that at least thirty per cent of
the population may have been tattooed (Allison 1996, 127).
Chimú tattooists applied their tattoo pigments with
various types of fine needles (fishbone, parrot quill, spiny
conch), each of which have been found in mummy bur-
ials (Allison et al. 1981, 221). Tattoos were pricked-in and also
skin-stitched, a technique similar to the “facial embroidery”
of the Yupiget and other Arctic peoples (Allison et al. 1981,
221). It has been suggested that women may have been the
primary tattooists when areas of skin were stitched with pig-
ment (Krutak 2007, 187). Their expert knowledge of working
animal skins and hides would certainly have facilitated the
need for precision when piercing the human epidermis with
tattoos.
Recently, Pabst et al. (2010) reinvestigated a tattooed
1000-year-old mummy discovered at Chiribaya Alta in
southern Peru, a corpse first uncovered in 1990 near Ilo (Fig.
6A & 6B). This mummy was not Chimú, rather this individ-
ual was probably a member of the Tiwanaku culture (Allison
cited in Krutak 2007, 193). Pabst et al. (2010) have established
that the ancient woman was tattooed with two different
organic pigments. One of these “dying particles” (i.e., soot
carbon) assumed a more rounded shape and comprised the
woman’s decorative tattoos (hands, leg), whilst the other (i.e.,
charcoal from an unidentified pyrolysed plant material) was
more linear in form (Pabst et al. 2010, 3258) and comprised
the circular tattoos on her neck. These partially overlapping
circles, twelve in all, were tattooed upon the dorsal aspect of
the neck and were found to align with acupuncture points
utilized today to relieve neck and head discomfort.
Upon review, however, both pigments studied by Pabst
et al. (2010) are essentially the same: they are forms of car-
bonized material. One plausible candidate for the unidenti-
fied pyrolysed plant material is genipap or jagua fruit (huito);
a substance that should be examined for as tattoo pigment
in future mummy studies of this region. In the late 1980s,
Peruvian archaeologists conducted a salvage operation ap-
proximately one hundred miles north of Lima at the site
of Vegueta in the Huaura Valley and discovered a cache of
mummies dating to the early Chimú period. This remark-
able find, which has yet to be published (Thomas Pozorski,
personal communication, 2004), yielded several tattooed
mummies dating to A.D. 1100; each clutching the dried-up
fruit of the genipap (Genipa Americana L.) in the palm of its
outstretched hand (Knol 1990).
Juices of the green, immature fruits of the genipap
have been and continue to be used as black body paint and
are incorporated into tattoo pigment by historic and con-
temporary indigenes of South America (Erikson 1999, 391;
Karsten 1926, 13, 39, 192; Lévi-Strauss 1970, 166; Nimuendajú
1948a, 287; 1948b, 309; Romanov 2004, 74; von den Steinen
1899, 32-33). Among some groups, the colouring substance
was highly esteemed because it was believed to repel incor-
poreal spirits (Karsten 1926, 13, 29, 63, 232). This was espe-
cially true of the headhunting Shuar (Jívaro) and Mundu-
rucú who painted themselves and their trophy heads with
genipap to protect the victor from the spirit of the deceased
(Horton 1948, 278; Karsten 1923, 18, 25, 38-39, 43-48; Rivet
1907-08, 248).
Genipap also is the source of various medicinal prod-
ucts used to treat arthritis, venereal sores, corneal opacities,
stomach ulcers, and uterine cancer in Amazonia (Castner
et al. 1998, 55; Morton 1987, 443). Sometimes it is used as an
abortifacient (Duke & Vasquez 1994, 79). In Central Amer-
ica, the pulverized seeds, or a decoction of its flowers, are
commonly given as a febrifuge (Castner et al. 1998, 55; Mor-
31

A Photographs Lars Krutak.
ton 1987, 443), and in Guatemala, indigenous peoples “carry
the fruits in their hands in the belief that this will provide
protection from disease and ill-fortune” (Morton 1987, 443).
Perhaps the genipap symbolized something similar for the
Chimú people of the Huaura Valley, a fundamental belief that
the medicinal plant afforded a form of efficacious protection
against evil influences encountered in life as well as in death.
5. Pigment Power
Through several marked examples, it has been demonstrated
that ancient peoples the world over utilized carbonized
charcoal products to create medicinal tattoos. The therapeutic
efficacy of this organic substance also compelled the Iceman
to orally ingest it in an attempt to cure abdominal complaints
that arose from whipworm infestation.
By nature, charcoal is sterile from the high degree of
heat to which it has been subjected. Charcoal also is unique
because it adsorbs – through electrical attraction – toxins
to the surface of its particles. Charcoal has been shown to
adsorb infectious bacteria (Beckett et al. 1980) and uric acid
(Shapiro 1991): or more specifically those salts derived from
urate crystals that sometimes become deposited in tissues of
the body, especially the joints (i.e., synovial fluid and synovial
lining), as a result of arthritis or gout. Charcoal poultices also
have proven effective in cleaning persistent wounds (Beckett
et al. 1980) and curing joint sprains (Thrash & Thrash 1981)
because they exert anti-inflammatory properties.
In January 2011, the author conducted field research
among the indigenous Kayan of Sarawak (Malaysian Bor-
neo). The Kayan are a Malayo-Polynesian people and one
32
Figures 7A-C. Kayan therapeutic tattoos.
of many Orang Ulu or “upriver” groups inhabiting the cen-
tral districts of Sarawak along the Baram, Rejang and Bintulu
rivers. Until the early 1960s, the Kayan practiced extremely
elaborate forms of tattooing that were conducted by female
practitioners who worked under the protection and tutelage
of a spiritual patron (Krutak 2007, 85). Today, traditional tat-
tooing practices associated with religious and spiritual cul-
ture are no longer practiced.
However, some families continue to apply therapeutic
tattoos to injured joints and sprains via the traditional
technique of hand-tapping (Fig. 7A-C). The tattoo oper-
ator I met inherited her position and tattooing implements
from her mother, who was another medicinal tattooist.
Tattoo pigments were always carbonized wood charcoal,
and no specific variety was mentioned as being preferred
over others. Many longhouse members of the community,
including the headman, his wife, and dozens of other indi-
viduals sported indelible stains located at primary limb joints:
knee, ankle, wrist, and elbow. In some cases, the therapeutic
markings resembled a tattooed band or bracelet encircling
the wrist, just like that worn by the Iceman. Oftentimes, if
a particular limb was injured on more than one occasion,
treatment was repeated at the same loci. Several community
members displayed evidence of multiple tattoo applications.
All informants reported that this form of indelible therapy
was extremely efficacious in the treatment of sprains. After
the initial tattoo application, swelling decreased and full mo-
bility was restored to injured areas within one week.
Taken together, the charcoal infused pigments of the
Kayan either activated healing power, marked the locations
for (re)application of acupressure or acupuncture treatments
(cf. Dorfer et al. 1999, 1025), or performed both functions
simultaneously. Whatever the purpose or result, the find-
ings presented here provide strong evidence that this form
of tattoo-puncture therapy is quite ancient, and continues to
be practiced by the Kayan some 5300 years after the earliest
reported instance, that of the Iceman.
B
 C
6. Summary
For more than five millennia, tattooing has been a perma-
nent part of medicinal culture the world over. Far from
being either an arcane or quotidian medical technique, tat-
tooing worked to help negotiate humanity’s relationship
with the body as it continually struggled with those physio-
logical and spiritual processes that threatened to injure and
destroy it. Because corporeal marking allowed individuals to
gain control over the boundaries and passages of their bod-
ies, to which and from which sickness and health flowed, it
was enmeshed in a therapeutic complex of personal power
and magic illustrating communal and individual desires and
fears. Thus, medicinal tattooing provided the skin with a sec-
ondary covering that was fundamental in protecting it from
the natural and supernatural elements of its surrounding en-
vironment, while also interactively shaping it by firmly an-
choring local indigenous values on the epidermis for all to see.
Acknowledgements
I am indebted to the people of St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, and the
Kayan community members of Uma Bawang longhouse, Sungai
Asap, Sarawak, for sharing their knowledge of traditional and thera-
peutic tattooing practices. Fieldwork amongst the Kayan would
not have been possible without a generous grant from the Daniele
Agostino Derossi Foundation and translation provided by the always
generous Lyvian Hulo Luhat.
33
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