A tattooed, mummified hand of a Chancay person from Peru from 1,200 years ago.Credit...Michael Pittman and Thomas G. Kaye
The New York Times has an article about ancient tattoos on mummies from Peru. Using a tool, laser-stimulated fluorescence, or L.S.F., usually used to study soft tissue in dinosaur fossils, scientists in Hong Kong have discovered intracate tatoos on mummified remains from the coast of Peru. The culture, referred to as the Chancay, left behind a wealth of cultural artifacts that now includes these fine tattoos. The research was published recently in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“We were shocked by just how fine the tattoo lines were in our L.S.F. images,” said Michael Pittman, an assistant professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and an author of the new study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in an email. “We immediately knew that what we were seeing was special.”
The mummies featured in the new study had been buried at the Cerro Colorado cemetery, and were rediscovered in 1981. Their tattoos are roughly 1,000 years old and display ornate geometric designs, reminiscent of scales or vines, as well as an amorphous animal with a curled tail.
The Chancay have long been known for high levels of craftsmanship across their material culture, and left elaborate markings in far more than their tattoos, said Aaron Deter-Wolf, a prehistoric archaeologist at the Tennessee Division of Archaeology who specializes in ancient tattoos and was not involved in the study.