Tattooing In Ancient China

 
In a new section of the Tattoo Temple Guide we will be posting a contemporary series of academic, peer-reviewed journal articles exploring the history and appearance of tattooing across the globe. The first entry is from Carrie E. Reed and offers a fascinating insight into the use of tattoos in Ancient China from the ninth century. These even include descriptions of decorative pieces right up to full-body compositions;
 
"Although the study takes a widely cross-temporal view, covering texts from the Zhou to the Ming dynasties, its organizing focus is the twenty-five entries on tattoo found in the ninth-century miscellany, Youyang Zazu. The author of this work, Duan Chengshi (c. 800-863), is remarkable because of his extraordinary interest in all types of tattoo, but particularly for his meticulous description of the voluntary decorative tattoos of his contemporaries. Given the fact that in China permanent body-marking was highly stigmatized, and cause for social ostracism, the information given in the Youyang Zazu and other texts on tattoo is thought-provoking and valuable... His beautiful descriptions of full-body tattoo raise many questions, questions of immense interest for students of Tang life and culture, as well as of informal narrative literature. What do we learn from the entries in a collection of informal narratives, such as a miscellany, that we do not learn from other types of texts? In what way does this collection of entries augment information already available? Besides communicating fascinating and educational data about the socio-cultural world of his time, Duan's tattoo entries may reveal something of Duan's own interests and world-view in general... "
 
The full article is here with others to follow over the coming months
 

Tattoo Temple - Joey Pang