Tattoos on Ancient Egyptian Mummies Revealed Through Infrared Imaging

Archeologists found seven 3000 year old mummies sporting some of the earliest known tattoos. Up until that point, only six mummies had been found with tattoos, but with the new technology, mummies in museums all over the world are being scanned and are providing new insights into ancient tattooing. The only mummies in Deir el-Medina with tattoos, so far, have been women.

Using infrared scans to look at Ancient Egyptian mummies. The tattoos that were revealed above include two stylized eyes that symbolize protection and a hieroglyph of a bent papyrus plant with water. Credit: Anne Austin / University of Missouri

One mummified woman had as many as thirty tattoos, according to archaeologist Anne Austin of the University of Missouri–St. Louis at the yearly meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research. In her research statement in the posted abstracts at asor.org, Austin notes that the tattoos were used not only for religious purposes but to “forge permanent, public identities”.

In 2018, tattoos were revealed on a female and a male mummy from over five thousand years ago in the British Museum in London. The famous iceman, Ötzi, who lived about 3100 BC and whose nearly complete skeleton was found preserved in glacier ice on the Similaun Glacier in the Tyrolean Ötztal Alps, on the border of Italy and Austria in 1991 was found to have sixty-one tattoos.

The majority of them consisted of groups of straight lines found mostly on his legs and arms leading his caregivers to believe they may have been therapeutic due to the fact that the lines were usually placed where his bones show degradation. According to Discover magazine, a newly discovered tattoo on Ötzi’s chest has been found where there are no signs of illness or bone wear, but it may have been painful due to conditions that left no scar on the body. It is also possible that the Iceman’s tattoos had nothing to do with health problems and have a totally different meaning, if any.

A little after ancient Egyptian tattoos, Ancient Roman slaves and criminals were tattooed as well. In ancient times, before the use of ink, pigments were made of ashes and soot and sometimes plant materials mixed with oils.

The first tattoo guns were invented in 1891, and before that, simple needles or chisels were used with hammers to pierce the skin, and the ink was chiseled directly into the holes in the skin. Early colors were made from carbon, cinnabar, and cadmium compounds, according to Authority Tattoo.

Recently tattoos which are invisible unless held under a black light to make them glow in the dark have been developed using phosphorus, a toxic chemical element. As most modern inks are vegetable or metal based, many tattooists are hesitant to use a known cancer causing agent not approved by the FDA. UV ink, which does not contain phosphorus, also glows under a blacklight, fluorescent light, and LED lights and can be well tolerated by the body.