TATTOOING the body with various figures of animals or plants, or with scrolls, has been in use from the most ancient times. It was forbidden by Moses in the Levitical law ; it was not known among the Copts, but must always have been in use among the Lower Egyptians. It was used by the Arab prisoners of Rameses, and is practised by the Egyptian Arabs and Arab women of the present day. On the return of Philpator to Egypt, he showed his hatred of the Jewish nation by his treatment of the Jews in Alexandria. He made la law that they should lose the rank of Mace donians, and he enrolled them among the class of Egyptians. He ordered them to have their bodies marked with pricks, in the form of an ivy leaf, in honour of Bacchus ; and those who refused to have this done were outlawed, or for bidden to enter the courts of justice. The king himself had an ivy leaf marked with pricks upon his forehead, from which be received the nickname of Gallus. The fellaheeu or country women of Palestine generally tattoo stars and dots, with gunpowder, on their foreheads, lips, chins, breasts, arms, hands, and feet. The tattooing of women is a practice very prevalent amongst several of the races in Persia, and dots and marks are used by Arab women. The Muliammadans_ of India do not tattoo or mark their skins in any way, neither men nor women, but rnost of the women of the Dravidian races uiark their forearms from the wrist to the elbow, with scrolls. The Kharria, Juanga, Munda, Ho, Kol, and Oraon girls have lines tattooed on the forehead and temple, and (lots on the chin and nose. The Singbhum girls have a tattooed arrow. Oraon boys have severely tattooed antis. The llo use the mark of an arrow. It is called godna, 21180 godui, by the Mahrattas. no Khania women are all tattooed with the !narks on the forehead and temples,—three parallel lines on the forehead, the outer lines terminating at the itfmer end in a crook, and two on each temple. The marks of tho Juanga women are larl4er, and those of the Munda are smaller than the Kliarria marks. In Southern India almost all Sudra and Pariah women have tattooing marks on them. A blue line runs down the fore head to the root of the nose, a practice which some of the Sudra men and women of the Smart ta Brahmans also follow. The wonien also have their forearms tattooed with flowers, and the men put a scorpion on the hollow between the thutnb and forefinger of the right hand. These hand and forearm marks are for ornament, but the forehead mark is now regarded as a sectarian Hindu mark. The Khand, also higher Abor tribes, tattoo. The Abor Naga clans do not permit marriage until their faces are elaborately tattooed and dis figured ; and the practice prevails among the Simang and Binua and other Ultra - Indian and Asianesian tribes. The Kol and Oraon women are all marked with the godna tattooing, the Agarealt women (agricultural) on the arms and legs.
The faces of the Khyen women, near the Ira wadi, are all tattooed over with deep blue marks, a custotn introduced avowedly to make them unattractive, but is being discontinued under British rule.
Every male Burman is tattooed in his boyhood front the waist to the knees ; in fact, he has a pair of breeches tattooed on him. The pattern is a fanciful medley of animals and arabesques, but it is scarcely distinguishable save as a general tint, excepting on a rather fair skin ; tracing on various parts the figures of animals or plants, in a manner so pleasing that British officers have often been attracted to submit to the painful and barbarous process. Tattooing of the Burman lads is not un frequently followed by sloughing and death. In Fiji this practice is confined to the women, the operation being performed by members of their own sex, and applied solely to the corners of the mouth, and those parts of the body covered by the scanty clothing worn by them. The skin is punctured by an instrument made of bone, or by the spines of the shaddock tree, vthilst the (lye injected into the punctures is obtained chiefly from the candle-nut, Aleurites triloba. They believe that the custom was commanded by Degei, their supreme deity. Neglect of this divine com mandment is believed to be punished after death. In Polynesia the practice seems to have attained its culminating point in the Society Islands and the Marquesas, where both men and women sub mitted to it ; in Samoa and Tonga, it is restricted to the men, in Fiji to the women, and altogether ceasing in the New Hebrides. Tradition, however, asserts that the custom was known in Fiji before its being adopted in Satnoa or Tonga. Two goddesses, Taema and Tilafainga, swtun from Fiji to Samoa, and on reaching the latter group, com menced singing, Tattoo the men but not the women.' Hence the two were worshipped as the presiding deities by those who followed tattooing as a trade.
A race in Japan tattoo their skins. Tattooing is practised in the Acbniralty Islands, chiefly by the women. Most of tile men have circular cicatri zations. Erskine, in his Course in the Pacific, mentions that the natives of the Samoan or Navigators' Islands have exactly the same fa.shion. The tattooing in Tahiti has greatly clecrmsed ; fonnerly the bodies were completely covered over with beautiful figures, exhibiting every variety of curve, with animals, flowers, and the sprigs and branches of treea.
Tattooing in the Society Islands was done by professional men who travelled about the country. The instruments used were bits of bone cut into the shape of small combs, and the soot of burned candle-nut. —Skinner's Overland Journey, p. 208; Montgomery, p. 127 ; Galion's Vacation Tourists ; Sharpe's Egypt, p. 344 ; De Bode's Travels, p. 85 ; Dalton, Ethnol. of Bengal ; Yuk, p. 151 ; Jenkins' American Expedition, p. 164.