The word
tattoo, or
tattow in the 18th century, is a
loanword from the Polynesian word
tatau, meaning "correct, workmanlike".
[1] The
Oxford English Dictionary gives the
etymology
of tattoo as "In 18th c. tattaow, tattow. From Polynesian (Tahitian,
Samoan, Tongan, etc.) tatau. In Marquesan, tatu." Before the importation
of the Polynesian word, the practice of tattooing had been described in
the West as pricking, painting, or staining. Sailors on the voyage
later introduced both the word and reintroduced the concept of tattooing
to Europe.
[2]
This is not to be confused with the origins of the word for the military drumbeat — see
military tattoo. In this case, the English word tattoo is derived from the Dutch word
taptoe (
OED).
The first written reference to the word
tattoo (or
tatau), appears in the journal of
Joseph Banks (24 February 1743 – 19 June 1820), the naturalist aboard
Captain Cook's ship the
HMS Endeavour: "I shall now mention the way they mark themselves indelibly, each of them is so marked by their humor or disposition".
The word "tattoo" was brought to
Europe by the explorer
James Cook, when he returned in 1769 from his first voyage to Tahiti and
New Zealand.
In his narrative of the voyage, he refers to an operation called
"tattaw". Before this it had been described as scarring, painting, or
staining.
[3]
Tattoo enthusiasts may refer to tattoos as "ink", "pieces", "skin art", "tattoo art", "tats", or "work"; to the creators as
"tattoo artists", "tattooers", or "tattooists"; and to places where they work as "tattoo shops", "tattoo studios", or "tattoo parlors".
A tattooed man's back,
Japan, c. 1875
Mainstream art galleries hold exhibitions of both conventional and custom tattoo designs such as
Beyond Skin, at the
Museum of Croydon. Copyrighted tattoo designs that are mass-produced and sent to tattoo artists are known as "
flash", a notable instance of
industrial design.
Flash sheets are prominently displayed in many tattoo parlors for the
purpose of providing both inspiration and ready-made tattoo images to
customers.
The Japanese word
irezumi means "insertion of ink" and can mean tattoos using
tebori,
the traditional Japanese hand method, a Western-style machine, or for
that matter, any method of tattooing using insertion of ink. The most
common word used for traditional Japanese tattoo designs is
Horimono. Japanese may use the word "tattoo" to mean non-Japanese styles of tattooing.
Anthropologist
Ling Roth in 1900 described four methods of skin marking and suggested they be differentiated under the names "tatu", "
moko", "
cicatrix", and "
keloid".
