Charles Pierre Claret de Fleurieu, Voyage autour du monde (1798)
MEANING OF SPIRAL TATTOO PROFESSIONAL
Starting around the 1870s, a few former sailors began opening professional tattoo parlors in port cities in the United States and England, especially after the development of the electric tattoo machine in the 1890s. These tattoo artists informally developed a graphical vocabulary including nautical images such as mermaids and ships.
Common symbols include swallows, nautical stars, and anchors.įor centuries, tattooing among sailors mostly happened during downtime at sea, applied by hand with needles and tattoo ink made with simple pigments such as soot and gunpowder. Sailor tattoos have served as protective talismans in sailors' superstitions, records of important experiences, markers of identity, and means of self-expression. People participating in these traditions have included military service members in national navies, seafarers in whaling and fishing fleets, and civilian mariners on merchant ships and research vessels. These practices date back to at least the 16th century among European sailors, and since colonial times among American sailors. Sailor tattoos are traditions of tattooing among sailors, including images with symbolic meanings.
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