The Illustrated Man

by John Fortescue

Picture the scene: you have just arrived in Scotland for the first time and are confronted by a terrible sight: hundreds of semi-naked men, covered from head to toe in tattoos and ritual scars, shouting and screaming in an incomprehensible language.

This may sound like Sauchiehall Street when the Tartan Army are in town, but it was in fact the first meeting of Julius Caesar and the fearsome Picts – the tribe that once inhabited ancient Scotland and which also provided us with the first evidence of body art in Britain.

Caesar described northern Britain as an area "partly occupied by barbarians who bear on their bodies from childhood scars ingeniously formed in the likeness of various animals."

During the Roman period Britons were famous for their tattoos, and it is thought that the word ‘Briton’ may be derived from a Breton word meaning "painted in various colours."

The Romans themselves were known to indulge in body art; centurions would have their nipples pierced as a sign of their devotion to the empire, and gladiators would pierce the penis so as to tie them beneath their bodies, keeping them out of the way to avoid damage.

Ancient roots

But the origins of body art go back even further - to the Egyptians.

Mummified bodies from around 2000 BC show women with tattooed thighs and some have been found with piercings, most commonly ears.

Pharaohs were also known to have their belly button pierced as a status symbol.

But, the oldest example of body art comes from a frozen body found in the Italian Alps in 1991.

The man, known as Ötzi, had dots and crosses tattooed on his ankle and lower leg and is thought to be around 5,200 years old.

In the year 325, the Church decreed that facial tattoos disfigured the man that was "made in God’s image" and were therefore considered profane.

Tattoos just about clung on in Europe until the middle ages; King Harold’s body was identified after the Battle of Hastings by the word Edith tattooed on his chest ­– who variably has been described as his sister, wife or mistress.

The word tattoo itself was first used by Captain Cook and derives from the Polynesian.

Irezumi

Around the same time that Cook was discovering the Pacific in the late 1760s, the Japanese art of Irezumi was flourishing.

Irezumi are tattoos that would often cover large parts of the body, such as the entire back.

The skill and intricacy of Irezumi made them more pieces of valuable fine art than just tattoos and galleries and collectors would buy the skins of people with the most beautiful designs, paying when they were alive and collecting their masterpiece on death.

Following in King Harold’s footsteps, George V was tattooed by a Japanese artist known as the ‘Shakespeare of tattoos’.

Winston Churchill’s mother, Lady Randolph Churchill had the Royal coat of arms tattooed in celebration of the coronation in 1901, as did many other fashionable aristocratic ladies of the age.

They also commonly had makeup tattooed on their faces, such as red lips and dark eyebrows – which is something that is practiced still to this day.

Of all the 19th century aristocratic body art, what is referred to as the Prince Albert piercing is probably the most infamous.

It is said that Queen Victoria’s husband wanted to ‘tame’ the appearance of his large penis, and therefore would tie a string through the piercing and around his thigh to prevent it from showing.

There is, however, no evidence that the Prince ever had such a phallic modification.

Lower classes

Away from the lords and ladies of England, tattoos were popular amongst the lower classes and ne’er-do-wells, namely sailors and prisoners.

Sailor tattoos form some of the most common designs even to this day, but were traditionally symbolic of the sailor’s travels; an anchor meant that he had crossed the Atlantic and a ship that he had rounded Cape Horn.

In British prisons in the 20th century, a common tattoo was of the letters ACAB, usually on the knuckles or the forehead.

It can stand for "always carry a bible" but within the less salubrious setting of the criminal fraternity it means "all coppers are bastards."

Another common prison tattoo is the teardrop by the eye.

This can signify that a friend has been killed, or that you have killed someone while in prison.

And so we’ve come full circle, from the murderous Picts, to murderous inmates.

After all, 5,000 years on, body art still plays a part in British culture.