TATTOOING

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 478, 6 October 1928, Page 26

TATTOOING

MAGIC AND MYSTERY ! LINKED WITH EARLY PRIMITIVE DESIGNS

SAILORS’ PICTURE GALLERY

SABI TA’ALA DUKK!” This familiar street cry in Egyptian town and village—thousands of our soldiers must have heard it —is an invita-

tion to youth to be ornamented: “O boy, come and get tattooed.” And the boy who, from vanity or other reason, responds, will pay in pain, as well as piastres. For the tattooer uses needles, five or six in a row along a stick, to make indelible markings in the flesh. It is among savages, however, that tattooing reaches its highest level, as a craft, a custom, and the maximum of suffering entailed. Some of our fashions, writes Charles Barrett for the Melbourne “Herald,” are as barbarous as the custom of body-marking and painting, which for unnumbered years has flourished among untutored peoples. But we are more careful of our skins than the savages, who endure knife-cuts and punctures that they may be beautiful, according to their standards. That is the popular view, and a “painted savage” we regard as a dandy. He may be; only designs, in scars, stained punctures or ochre, are not solely, or mainly, for adornment; at least in many cases.

Magic and mystery are linked with corporal marking; and with the art may be associated elaborate ritual. A charming pattern in punctures may have, for the Papuan, or the Maori, a meaning rooted in tribal legend; may be of deep religious significance. Tattootng is related to taboo. Ethnologists, prying into the past and comparing their discoveries with present customs, have decided that, as Hambly expresses it, “body marking presents an almost complete story of ritual, taboo, and belief.” It is “largely concerned with attempts to secure a place in heaven”; also to secure the right to higher social status, to help in the holding of class privileges, etc. In short, it’s a highly complex subject, this of body marking, unless considered merely as an Among the civilised, tattooing perhaps is for ornament only; or, in some cases, for remembrance, or the sealing of a pact. Your sailorman may have his arms and his broad chest covered in tattooed pictures—anchors and lover’s knots, and 3'°:’’ raits of a sweetheart or two. And he is not the only man with a fancy for this really savage form of decoration. Tattooers in great cities earn a living still. Paying the fee, you have a fair choice for your money. Soldiers and sailors are generally held to be the best customers of the body artist; the most numerous, though his art may be employed on all sorts and conditions of men. A SUBJECT FOR SPECULATION Students of the custom differ as to its meaning. Some declare that it is purely decorative; that a man, or a woman, suffers the process of tattooing in order to be more attractive to the other sex. But the evidence is against the ornamental theory. Marshal the known facts and they form a battalion in support of the magico-religious hypothesis. Still, vanity, in some instances, provides an explanation, probably. Tattooing, as Captain Cook observed, so long ago, is a curious subject for speculation, having regard to its universality among savage races. Even the Eskimo practises the craft, recording in punctures in 1 the flesh his skill as a hunter. The Maoris, popularly, are regarded as the “universal tattooists”; and certainly they are past masters of the art. No pagan tribe’s designs can rival the Maori moko tattooing for symmetry, balance and intricate details for perfect tattoo pictures. There are moko heads, with geometrical

figure designs, that are, well, masterpieces, works of art, though gruesome. At auction, in London, “finely tattooed New Zealand heads” have been sold at bargain prices—in 1834, one specimen brought only 18s 9d. But values increased, and only a few years ago £4O was given for a “Maori head.” Collecting these trophies, and examples of the strangest of all the arts, is a hobby with surely, but a few' devotees. General Robley was one, and in his book, “Moko, or Maori Tattooing,” he gives a history of the art, describes the methods of embalming the heads, and the old-time traffic in these trophies—the horrid fruit, mainly, of tribal wars. Moko heads w r ere exchanged for muskets. Often slaves were victims; and stories of head-hunting expeditions are told. It has even been stated that men, with finely tattooed heads, were paraded, by a chief, before a trader, that he might make a choice! In 1902, it is recorded, in “A Romance of the Rostrum,” General Robley visited Stevens, of the famous auction rooms, in King Street, Lon don, bringing with him the most amazing “luggage”—33 tatooed Maori heads, packed in four portmanteaux! The heads were arranged on a sheet, and photographed—-a group for a Chamber of Horrors. The heads, later, were sold at auction, prices ranging from £2O to £4O for one specimen. China has a page or two in our story; but the Chinese, far from regarding tattooing as a decorative art, practice it on criminals —it is a punishment. Whether the design fits the crime, I do not know; but tattooing may be an agonising process, as you will learn from Maori legend—the story of Mataora, who was tattooed by Ue-tonga with a bone chisel, which he used with no gentle hand. Mataora, in his anguish, sang the lament for his wife, Niwareka, whom he had beaten, so that she ran away I from him.