Tattooing has been common for many centuries in tribes scattered across the vastness of the Indian subcontinent. The tribes would view the tattoos as unstealable jewelry, or as a means to make young women seem unattractive to neighboring tribes who might otherwise steal them. In the northeast, headhunters would bear facial tattoos that recounted how many lives they had taken.
In the intoxicating heat of southern India, permanent tattoos have long been a tradition. Referred to as pachakutharathu, they only ceased being popular around 1980. The tattoo artists would travel around creating tattoos of labyrinth-like snares on people’s bodies so that they could ward off evil.
The Indian subcontinent is home to such a long and complex history of inhabitants that it is impossible to recount all the tattoo traditions present. In some cultures, tattoos were a means of marking those in lower castes so as to keep them down in society.
Today, tattoos have begun to take a similar form as in western culture, with young people getting them as a fashion statement. This represents the opportunity for Indians to keep their histories alive in body art while moving into the country’s fast-developing future.
