Cultural Rescue of Ancient Tattooing in Mexico

OLMAN PROJECT - Cultural Rescue of Ancient Tattoo in Mexico

Mexico and, in fact, all of Mesoamerican cultures have fascinated Europeans for the past several centuries. Although knowledge of Mesoamerican 'phenomenon' was mostly incomprehensible for European moral and value standards and believes, many written studies on these matters have appeared in last couple of hundred years. Some people may still endow the land and its people with the tinge of exoticism while the others may both fear and admire the great cultures of ancient Mesoamerica. The term 'Mesoamerica' is used by historians, archaeologists and anthropologists to describe the large part of the territories of Central America, at the time of the Spanish conquest in the beginning of the 16th. century, including much of modern Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, western strip of Honduras and El Salvador and on down through Nicaragua and Nicoya Peninsula of Costa Rica.

For a long time the western world have presumed that the tribes that lived in Mesoamerica were undeveloped and primitive savage bunch of 'Devil worshippers'. On the contrary, civilizations of ancient Mesoamerica have had a very rich history. Beside the fact that they have fully developed written language they are still continuing to amaze our 'modern world' with their spectacularly precise mathematical and astronomical measuring systems of time and space, as well as with the high level of aesthetics of their art and superb architectural skills which are puzzling the minds of the great engineers and architects to this day. Wise men of those great cultures left written manuscripts about life and death, about their thoughts and happenings around them, about their complex relationship with the Gods.

At the time of the Spanish invasion in 1519, which is considered to be an end of the 'Late Postclassic period', the Aztecs played major role on the continent, although the role of the Maya, Totonacs, Huastecs and Mixtecs remained important and it was speculated to be over 20 million people living in Mesoamerica. The first impressions of Spaniards with the customs and rituals of the indigenous people were both intriguing and horrifying. Miguel Luna de Orellana, a self proclaimed member of the Cortes expedition wrote:

"By all accounts, the Indians of this land to the west do not want us to settle there. They are hostile people who resisted two earlier expeditions, and they are a strange idolatrous people who wear body tattoos and practice human sacrifice."

Being oblivious to the habits of natives and blinded by greed, the quest for wealth and social advancement motivated Spaniards to commit brutal atrocities and almost totally obliterate millenniums of gradually developed knowledge. Following the fall of Tenochtitlan (todays Mexico City) in 1521, populated at the time by the Mexica people (how they called themselves) or Aztecs, Mesoamerican polytheistic religion (worshipping a number of natural elements, both zoomorphic and anthromorphic) was transformed rapidly and for ever. Native temples,sculptures, hieroglyphic writing and books were systematically destroyed and all religious exercisers were vigorously suppressed.

However not all of the books were destroyed. Some have survived and Cortes himself is thought to have sent two of the Maya folding books to King Charles of Spain and to Holy Roman Emperor. They are known today as Madrid and Dresden Codex (they are named after the cities or families in whose libraries they were conserved). But the most complete record of the Maya myths and history is Popol Vuh.

Beside human sacrificing and cannibalism, among other forbidden practicies the ancient technique of tattooing was included as well. Spanish have brutally unforced their own catholic religious believes upon the natives and not long after, the practice of tattooing was not only completely abandoned but it also faded out of the minds of the native population. Not many of the evidences of this particular practice has survived the conquest. Yet in the National Anthropological Museum in Mexico few clay figures deriving from the Olmec people (commonly accepted to be one of the first high civilizations in Mesoamerica, together with Zapotecs) enable us recognize high level of body adornment practices showing tattoo patterns from the waist down to the knees as well as head deformations. Also some survived figurines found in Yucatan Peninsula show a male figure with the cheeks and chin tattooed with the drawing of a jaw bone and another simple design in the center of the forehead. According to Dr. Schellhas "the tattooing consists of simple markings made either around or at the side of the mouth". Another terracotta whistle figure of a head found in Tecolpa, Tabasco show tattoo designs on each cheek and on the lips as well. It is considered that tattooing seemed to have consisted of spiral scrolls at each corner of the mouth. Examples for this type of facial decorations could be seen on the lintels of Yuxchilan and on the richly ornamented wall with projecting sculpture of the head found in Uxmal (now in Mexico City). There is also an impressive piece of evidence on few of the Olmec terracotta sculptures which show direct link between the black Olmec or Xi people of Mexico and West Africans. They show scarification marks which indicate presence of Mende West Africans in ancient Mesoamerica. The patterns used on these Olmec sculptures are still common in some parts of Africa. Also the same style of scarification tattooing is still used by the Nuba and other Sudanese tribes in Africa. Another Olmec terracotta head from ancient Mexico show identical type of keloid tattoos on the face as it is displayed on the faces of some young Sudanese girls. One of those figurines considered to be 4000 years old is on the display at the Pennsylvania's Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. More figurines from the early cultures of ancient Mexico, like the funeral pottery ones from Tepic, Colima and Western Jalisco, show complete reproduction of native ornaments such as ear and nose ornaments and facial and body decorations. Fresco paintings of Santa Rita in Honduras show portions of human bodies covered with geometric markings. Circles surrounded with dots, short hooks and short parallel lines are the prevailing motives. It may mean that tattooed images represented a close relationship between humans and the nature, considering their conscious harmonic synchronization with the nature and the cosmic energies.

Not to get a wrong picture, tattooing was not exclusive only for Olmecs. It is practiced also by other cultures. Noble women of Totonac people often tattooed their faces with red ink. Mayan standards of beauty, among common women included being tattooed (after the marriage) from their waist up except for their breasts. Bishop Diego de Landa reported that tattoos covered the Maya's people chests, arms and faces and piercings in their ears, lips and noses held shell and jade jewelry.

And as much as we could say, with confidence, that we are familiar with the fact that they have embraced tattooing, considering applied techniques very little is known to us. There are different theories: from extremely painful skin-stitching (which is commonly connected with the indigenous peoples of the Arctic) and scarification (skin cutting) techniques to hand-tapping and hand-poked techniques but none of them could be proven. Some sources suggest that tattoo designs were painted on the body and then carefully cut in the flesh. Rubbing the ink solution in the wound would form the tattoo. This process is said to be extremely painful and for this reason it is considered that tattoos were the signs of personal bravery as the process would cause the infection and temporary illness.

Today, the gap of several hundred years of excluding tattooing practices may made inhabitants of modern Central America be unaware of the folklore reasons for and about tattooing of their ancestors. However tattooing and tattoos are extremely popular and widespread not only in today's Mexico but Worldwide and Mexican related imagery are nowadays a fashion. Yet not many tattoo artists are trying to dig in the past or furthermore research and try to revive the ancient tattoo techniques and designs. Not many but few certainly do: Sanya and Samuel. With their 'Olman' project, which is named after Samuel's Olmec ancestors, they are trying to revive and "rescue the ancient tattoo techniques of old Mexico" and their studio 'Olman' is located in the jungle inside of camping Panchan, near the Mayan archaeological site in Palenque in Chiapas.

Sanya was born in 1979 in Slovenia, a place which has very little in common with Mexico. In 1992 destiny took her to Mexico where she "immediately felt a great connection with the prehispanic ancestors" and which eventually became her new 'home'. Always being interested in art and bewitched by her new environment she started digging deeper into a rich cultural history of Mexico.

"The more I learned about their culture and their beautiful artistic expressions, in all the aspects, the more I liked it and went deeper into it".

Just half a year upon her arrival to Mexico, the faith brought her to Samuel, who was a body modifier at the time, whom she apparently married not long after they met.

"Samuel introduced me to the world of tattoo and one year after we met I started tattooing, with the machine. This was also a time when I found myself having a great interest for the ritual of traditional practice of ancient tattooing. In Mexico after the conquest tattooing has literally disappeared. The Spanish have forbidden almost everything what was traditional at the time. There is about a 500 year gap of inability for indigenous peoples to practice and preserve the ancient way of their tattooing techniques".

Lack of interest and informations about this way of tattooing among the native population only powered her curiosity in search for the truth. One year later, after spending a great deal of time in the libraries and bookstores around the country uploading informations, Sanya met a person who will eventually set her on the right course.

"One day a person I already new gave me a bamboo stick because he knew I was interested in the ancient kind of ways of tattooing. I was so excited that I couldn't sleep for days. At first I didn't know what I am going to do with it. There was no manual how to use or a teacher to advise me and guide me. The emotions and thoughts were tumbling through my head that I started to have visions."

Sorting out her 'uploaded data' she remembered some of the references from the books and magazines she has read in the past year and spontaneously followed her intuition how to make her tools ready for use. She didn't have to wait long to get her first client. An archaeologist who has overheard the tales about Sanya's quest, offered himself for her first sacred ritual of an 'ancient' way of tattooing.

Sanya speaks with excitement about this experience: "I began with the copal ceremony (sacred resin of the Copal tree). It is used in all of traditional rituals that have been preserved until now and it represents cleansing, permission from the sacred energy and a connection with it. Than I started to tattoo him without thinking of how to hold my new instrument or which technique I would use. I just let myself flow and I felt it as if I had been doing it forever. I was very excited when it was done. Remembering and relieving their symbolism I channeled this energy to honor the ancestors that have given me the inspiration and I promised myself that I shall focus on the cultural aspect of preserving traditional ways of tattooing rather then a commercial aspect."

But lacking informations on 'ancient' ways of tattooing in Mesoamerica, the question still remains of how sure could we actually be about actual techniques that we say they have applied?

Sanya has an explanation: "It is difficult to say exactly: Yes, this was the way. I personally think that they used different techniques. Reading some books, Samuel and me, found out that some Mesoamerican people were using same technique the indigenous people of Pacific islands like Tahiti or Samoa use still to this day: tapping technique. We also found some ancient inscriptions of tattoos, back then, being made with the wooden sticks, which again reminds us on the traditional Japanese way of tattooing. And it is kind of common knowledge that they used scarification as a way of applying tattoos. Samuel was already using this aspect of tattooing when we first met. Different techniques applied for different sorts of body modifications. It's a part of their culture, tattoos either being just a beauty mark or representing hierarchy being symbols of status in the society. Or even for the medical reasons such as preventing the pains of arthritis and rheum by mixing certain herbs and plants with the ink solution, for which the great knowledge of the Nature was required, or by means of acupuncture: regenerating the damaged skin stimulated by the needles."

Perhaps we would have to be patient, to wait for the future discoveries of 'new' artifacts that could lead us in the right direction but for now we have to rely on the knowledge that we have and open ourselves to the sacred energies to be able to receive the great cosmic consciousness.