Tattoos are generally associated with modern times, but their use stretches back thousands of years. In fact, according to a stunning new find, ancient people used tattoos much earlier than previously thought. Tattooing is an ancient art, but it has left only ephemeral traces in the archaeological record. Ancient tattoo tools are tough to find or even recognize as implements for creating skin designs. But new microscopic studies of two turkey leg bones with sharpened ends indicate that Native Americans used these items to make tattoos between around 5,520 and 3,620 years ago.
Why use tattoos? Today, getting a tattoo can mean different things for different people. Some see tattoos as a sign of rebellion. Others, as an homage. And while certain people might get tattoos as a joke, tattoos also play a significant role for breast cancer survivors reclaiming their body.
As for ancient people? There’s more research to be done. But Deter-Wolf is convinced that tattoos held an important place in the culture of ancient Native Americans.
The burial was found west of Nashville, Tennessee, at a riverside campsite called the Fern vale site, which had been using by prehistoric hunter-gatherers for centuries. The settlement was excavating to make way for a bridge in 1985, but archaeologists at the time did not fully analyze the findings. The set of bone needles, pigment-filled half-shells, and stone tools were collectively labeling a toolkit and put into storage, where they spent the next three decades.
Next to the unearthed tattoo tolls in Tennessee, archaeologists discovered shells that according to a radiocarbon study are estimate to be 5,200-year-old. This suggests that the North American tattoo kit could be older than 3,600 years. At this point, these are the world’s oldest unearthed tattoo tools. And they predate a group of 3000-year-old tattooing tools made from volcanic glass that were identified in 2016 at an archaeological site on an island in the South Pacific.
"Our analysis reveals that approximately 3500-1600 BCE, occupants of the Fern vale site employed sharpened turkey (Milagros gallop away) bone tools as tattooing implements, and that both red and black pigment remains are directly associated with these artifacts."
The assemblage consisted of a number of the implements - four sharpened turkey tarsus bones, two of which had points intact, and two smaller radius bones, with traces of pigment still discernible in the grain.
The radius bones. (Deter-Wolf et al., J Archaeal Sci Rep, 2021)
These bones were subjected to very close "scrutiny" - microscopy at magnification up to 140X, allowing the researchers to catalog tiny manufacturing marks and wear patterns; and X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy to help identify the pigments.
These were compared to the results of a previous paper, in which a different archaeologist crafted sharpened bones from a white-tailed deer, and used them to tattoo pig skin, to determine the manufacturing and wear patterns this would produce.
The spectroscopy revealed that red and black pigments on the radius bones were likely derived from iron oxide (ocher) and carbon materials - both recorded as traditional tattooing materials in archaeological literature.
Two turkey wing bones found in the same Fern vale grave display microscopic wear and pigment residues that likely resulted from applying pigment during tattooing, the scientists say. Pigment-stained seashells in the grave may have held solutions into which tattooers dipped those tools.
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