In September of 1991, German Hikers were enjoying an outing in the Ötztal Alps. These tourists expected to find stunning mountain views, but they soon made an unexpected and grisly discovery: a frozen body.
The well-preserved corpse belonged to a man. This mysterious victim would not show up on any missing person’s report because he was far older than he seemed. While this man likely died when he was 25-35 years old, his body was thousands of years old.
The Ice Man, nicknamed Ötzti for the Ötztal Alps where he was found, became one of the most famous mummies in the world. Ötzti’s clothing and weapons provide a glimpse into what life was like in the 3200s BCE. His body also gives medical researchers new insight into the history of tattoos and medicine.
Tattoos in Ancient Medicine
Ötzti died at a young age when compared to the life expectancy of people who live in Austria and Italy in the 21st century, but his body bears the marks of surviving in a difficult environment. Wear and tear in Ötzti’s spine, knees, and ankles indicate that he may have lived with arthritis.
So how did a hunter like Ötzti cope with the pain of arthritis thousands of years ago?
When researchers looked closer at Ötzti’s remains, they noticed small blue-gray lines etched into the skin of his back and legs. Throughout this life, Ötzti had 61 tattoos.
Could the pigments under Ötzti’s frozen skin point to an ancient medical practice? “We contend that the back and leg ‘medicinal’ tattoos correspond directly to sites of chronic right knee and right ankle pain,” anthropologists and health professionals stated in an article published in the journal Inflammopharmacology. In other words, many of the lines and dots etched on Ötzti’s body are close to areas where he had injuries or joint pain. Some anthropologists believe that Ötzti may have used tattooing as an acupuncture-like therapy to relieve his pain.
How would Ötzti have received his tattoos? A contemporary artist named Nicole Wilson wanted to gain insight into the ancient procedure and tattooed similar designs on her body to match Ötzti. Some ancient tattooing procedures may not be considered safe or sanitary today. Whoever gave Ötzti his tattoos would have made shallow cuts in Ötzti’s skin. Then, they would have rubbed charcoal into the fresh cuts. This ash lingered under the surface of Ötzti’s skin when his cuts healed. Wilson chose to have her tattoos done with her own blood rather than with ink or charcoal.
“Scientists think they might have acupuncture significance, but we don’t actually know. We can’t ask what the lines and the dashes and hashes meant to this person,” Wilson told Artnet News.
Lars Krutak is an anthropologist and an expert in tattooing traditions. Krutak found many similarities between Ötzti’s tattoos and acupuncture. In his book Spiritual Skin: Magical Tattoos and Scarification, Krutak wrote, “Incredibly, approximately 80 percent of [Ötzti’s] tattoos overlap with classical Chinese acupuncture points utilized to treat rheumatism, a medical condition that plagued the Iceman”
Could Tattoos Still Have Healing Benefits in the Modern Age?
While Ötzti provides an ancient example of tattoos, other people from other cultures have also used tattoos for therapeutic purposes. For generations, healers and artists in some Iroquois or Haudenosaunee communities have prized tattoos.
The process of getting a tattoo might be painful, but it can also release endorphins. A 2016 study in the American Journal of Human Biology reports that tattooing may help strengthen a person’s immune system. “Our data suggest that the body habituates over time to the tattooing stressor. It is possible that individuals with healthy immune systems heal faster” and may heal from future tattoos (or other mild skin injuries) more quickly, the researchers concluded.
Tattoos may improve a person’s emotional wellness. A 2019 study indicated that people who have scars from traumatic events are more likely to experience depression, low self-esteem, and social anxiety. While tattoos are also a kind of scar, many people get tattoos to cover scars from injuries, surgeries, or self-harm. Jenean LaCorte specializes in tattooing nipples for people who have had breast cancer. “When I see them at the follow-up, they say how much the tattoos have changed them — even if it’s just to get in the shower in the morning and not think, ‘I’ve had cancer,’” LaCorte told Insider. Medical tattoos can provide a sense of relief for people who feel like their scars are constant reminders of past trauma.
Researchers cannot be sure if Ötzti’s tattoo designs had symbolic, spiritual, or emotional significance to him. However, the Ice Man may have used tattoos to relieve his pain and help him hunt and live an active life. And in the 21st century, many tattoo artists continue to use tattoos for healing.