Event Details
Thursday, Nov 15, 2018
Lecture: The Ethnobotany of Tattooing
Time: 7:00 pm til 8:00 pm
Location: Weedon Island Preserve Cultural and Natural History Center, 1800 Weedon Dr NE, St Pete
Description: Archaeology Lecture Series - The Ethnobotany of Tattooing by Dr. Anna Dixon, an instructor of Anthropology at USFSP
The resurgence of interest in traditional tattooing, as well as concern about the safety of commercial inks, has led to a search for “natural,” “traditional,” products for tattoos. Scientific techniques for visualizing and analyzing ancient tattoos preserved on mummified human remains have been able to identify minerals and “pyrolized plant particles” (soot) in ancient tattoos, but not the plant taxa themselves. Ethnographic studies of traditional tattooing have focused largely on tattoo motifs, meaning and tool technology, with less emphasis on the botanical materials involved. While it is true that “soot” from burned plant material is the most common tattoo pigment, a variety of other plants were traditionally used to produce tattoos by either injecting colors under the skin or via the activity of irritant chemicals that produced tattoo-like marks. Indigenous peoples around the world have used a variety of plant substances to produce tattoos for therapeutic, decorative, commemorative or ritual reasons.
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FPAN is posting this event as a courtesy, we will neither be hosting nor attending this event.
