Base Of Spine Tattoos
3 May
Men and women in the developed world wear tattoos now, but it seems to me that they wear them differently. If a man has a tattoo it is there for the world to see on his arm, occasionally on his leg. However, women tend to secrete their tattoos around their bodies so that they can be revealed when they would like to display them. One favourite position is at the base of the spine.
The base of the spine is usually covered, but a short top can be worn to reveal it and blouses and cardigans frequently ride up, if someone bends down, giving a glimpse of the tattoo at the base of the spine. It has become very common to have a tribal or Oriental design put there.
Concealed tattoos like this and on other areas of the body like the upper thigh or upper chest are very sensual. The only people who know about them are the people who are allowed to go there. It is like a shared secret between close friends and lovers.
Besides the tribal designs and Oriental designs, women often have something written in an Eastern language at the base of their spines. The Chinese, Japanese or Thai characters are illegible to most people in the West, so again, it becomes a private message.
Not many women place their boyfriend’s name on their arm, like men do with their girlfriend’s names, but I know a few women who have had their boyfriend’s names tattooed on the bottom of their back in Chinese or Japanese characters. If you change boyfriend’s, you can always tell people that it means ‘good luck’ and there are only two billion people who would know the truth.
In addition to these designs, it is also fairly common to see birds, flowers and vines tattooed at the base of the spine. Birds and flowers are very pretty and colourful, but the vine is an ancient symbol of love in the gist of growing together.
The vine is a common symbol on Welsh love spoons too. The Welsh love spoon was given by a man to the woman he loved as a token of his sincerity. Lots of the symbols used in tattooing are also to be found on Welsh love spoons and the tradition of giving them predates Captain Cook’s rediscovery of tattooing on Samoa in the mid-Eighteenth century.
Another common design for lower back tattoos is the dragon (and dragonfly, for some reason). The dragon is also an Oriental and Celtic mythical animal – the red dragon appears on the Welsh flag, but it is an animal common to most European countries as well.
There are no rules concerning which tattoo should go where, but the lower back is quite a substantial region, so it lends itself to a larger tattoo. A bird or a dragon with outstretched wings looks good, as does a starscape, but the most well-liked is still the stylised picture of a vine growing in, through and around itself.
The Celtic symbolism of the vine was love, fertility and opportunity, but the vine is used as a symbol in both the Old and the New Testaments. In the Old Testament, it seems to refer mostly to Israel and in the New one to Jesus.
Owen Jones, the writer of this article writes on lots of topics, but is currently concerned with anchor tatoos. If you would like to know more go to our website at White Ink Tatoo.
