Late Archaic Tattooists & Tool Bundle Found in TENN.

[Olden]

"Archaeologists believe that this bundle, buried at least 3,600 years ago in a Late Archaic cemetery in Tennessee, may represent the world’s oldest surviving tattoo kit."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...ATTOO-kit.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=156&v=TTxVSsjGitg

[CoachG]

Very neat. Thanks for sharing it.

[Kyflintguy]

Thanks for sharing this Olden. Pretty neat set of tools they found. Makes me think tattoo needles are probably a lot more common in awk collections than we realize... Good stuff!

[OnewiththewilD]

Man I would love a late archaic tattoo!

[OnewiththewilD]

Looks painful too!

[sailorjoe]

You continue to bring us interesting articles to read. Many thanks. It proves that we should not always rest with old interpretations of things. I was wondering if what looks like the dozen or so claws from a predatory animal were from a necklace or part of the tool kit. Like Jay says. Looks to have been a very painful experience. The old timers were tough.

[OnewiththewilD]

I like your thought, perhaps you wore the necklace while getting the tattoo to “give you strength” to sit thru the process. Some of mine weren’t on the ticklish side, I can only imagine getting the designs incised in or jabbed in with those bones!

[Olden]

I think the bone tools found may be giving an incomplete picture here due to it's finer organic bits (literally) disappearing over time. The bones may have held 'ink' and something such as thorn bundles, or serrated bits that would give different effects, or wider patterns of a dye placement. I guess the bone tools could have been used as is, but would seem to me to be more the tools of scarification or torture..

Here's a few vids with 'primitive' ink tools, and some interesting cultural aspects of the art..

killing the pain by using alcohol probably wasn't always a good idea..