Tattooing among civilized people : Read before the Anthropological Society of Washington, December 19, 1882 / By Robert Fletcher.

  • Robert Fletcher
Date:
1883
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Tattooing among civilized people : Read before the Anthropological Society of Washington, December 19, 1882 / By Robert Fletcher. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    any one believe this, namely, that one of the forms of tribute to one of the conquerors of one the branches of the Khyens [a race in Aracan] was the payment of a certain number of beautiful women ? To avoid this, the beautiful women tattooed themselves so as to become ugly. This is why they are tattooed at the present time. So runs the tale. In reality they are tattooed because they are savages. The narrative about the conqueror is their way of explain- ing it. The obverse of the legend occurred in Burman. A handsome woman of rank was discovered in an intrigue with a young man of low birth. She was tattooed in the face in order to punish her by the destruction of her beauty.21 It has been asserted that tattooing was adopted to conceal the nakedness of the body, and in that manner to take the place of clothing. There seems to be no foundation for the belief. Cer- tainly modesty was absolutely unknown to the tattooed natives of Otaheite, as described by Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks. The distinguished anthropologist, Miklucho-Maclay, in a recent communication to the Society of Ethnology of Berlin, describing the natives of the archipelago of Pelan, states that the women all have the mons Veneris tattooed. The hair is removed by evulsion before the operation is performed. Miklucho-Maclay frequently asked young girls to lift up their kerint, a sort of petticoat of leaves which they wore, and to show him their tattooing. They readily complied, seeming to have no feeling of shame or modesty in relation to the matter. The appearance, he adds, was that of a triangular piece of blue stuff;22 and a plate of it duly appears in the Verhandlungen of the Society. Chief Engineer Melville informs me that the tribe of Tungoos which he had the good fortune to meet soon after landing at the mouth of the Lena were entirely unacquainted with the practice of tattooing, and evinced the most unbounded astonishment at the tattooed designs on the arms of some of his sailors who had stripped for ablution. They were curious to know how it was done, and perhaps some future generation of Tungoos may have a legend to tell as to the origin of tattooing in their tribe, in which that gallant officer may play a part. 21 Gouger, op. cit., p. 201. 22 Anthropologische Notizen, gesammelt auf siner Reise in West-Mikronesieu und Nord-Melanesien im Jahre, 1876. Verhannl d. Berl. Gesellsch. f. Anthrop. Ethnol., und Urgeschichte. Berl. 1878. x. 107., 1 pi,