Questions linked to tattoo are frequent from the tattoo or future one. Here are some answers.

TATTOO AND REMOVING TATTOO
Professeur S. JOUCDAR Service de Chirurgie Plastique et des Brûlés – E.H.S de Douéra – ALGERIA

INTRODUCTION
The origin of the word tattoo is oceania. in fact it’s the captain cook at the XVIIIth century that brings back from his trip in polynesia. the term tattoo derives from the root “ta” wich means design written in the skin” and “atoua” wich means spirit. since the origin skin and spirit are linked. Dictionaries define tattoo as: all the mean by whom a coloring (vegetal or mineral) is introduced under the skin wich produce a coloration or visible designs. those precisions exclude scarification even if it’s the same approach. the difference between the two process is the color of the skin. the scarification (tachrit) used in traditional medicine is an incision which ends as a scras wether curved inside or threedimensional like a sulpture on the dark skins. tattoo plays with contrast on white skins. the second caracter is the indelibility which is in a certain way the pric of it.

Nowadays tattoo is considered as a body adornment technic with several meanings.

HISTORIQUE

The most ancient tattoos are probably those found on cave paintings of tassili that represent women tattooed on the chest.

The egyptian mummies of the XIth dinasty (2065-1785 BC) revealed tattoos mainly on priestress, female dancers and musicians.

The romans, the scythe like the greeks used tattoo a lot, mainly to mark prisoners and slaves.

Other civilisations like the pre-colombian MASAS tattoos on the upper part of the body were common as show the status as well as on the legs, the neck and arms. in china and japan became a flourishing art between the VII and XIXth century. With magellan’s expeditions and captain cook travels tattoo entered europe and became universally known. amongst the famous tattooed persons there’s peter of russia (1672-1725) a hatchet on the chest. staline (1879-1953) had a skull on the chest. the kaiser frederic III. winston churchill had an anchor on his left arm. theodore roosvelt and even jf kennedy. so the yalta conference was a tattooee affair.

in algeria the lily is the most spread tattoo and generally the most done by north-africans of all sexs, ornamental and part of the traditional medicine and well spread in the south.