Embracing Tradition: The Significance of Tattoos in Yoruba Culture

Tattoos, body art, and all sorts of body modification and beautification date back several generations in history, and in different cultures, they hold significant meaning and are usually done to represent different things, such as tracing one's identity, representing social status, beautifying, marking a slave, and several others. In the Yoruba culture where I find my roots, tattoos aren't a newly adopted reality but part of our culture, and generations such as my mom and grandma have carried some of these tattoos that were sometimes even inscribed on them when they were just children.

You see, in the present day, we've come to see different people inscribe different things on their bodies, such as words, names, pictures of a person, objects, flowers, animals, and the like, and all of these are most often done just to express their creativity or express themselves the way they like. Tattoos have, through the years, become a form of identification where you see a group of friends, people, gangs, and the like draw the same symbol on their bodies to show their alliance to such a group.

Personally, I grew up fascinated by the different tattoos I saw on the bodies of those who surrounded me. I didn't grow up in a big city, so most of the tattoos I saw were mostly cultural and inscribed on the body for a particular purpose. I can remember one of my childhood friends, Niyi. He and his other siblings have a unique tattoo on their stomachs, and what's written there is their family name, the household they're from, and their home town. That's the most incredible tattoo I've seen. That's because of how many names are inscribed on their stomachs.

I can remember the first time I saw it. I asked loads of questions to which they couldn't provide the correct response, but upon arriving home, I asked my mom the same question, enquiring about why all my friends have tattoos, even my mom and grandmother do, and yet I don't have any. I told her I'd love to have a tattoo of my own, and then she sat me down and explained some things about our culture to me.

Mum went on to tell me that even though my friends and his family can all have tattoos, I can't, and I get the reason because in my hometown, only women are supposed to have tattoos, tribal marks, and the like, and any man from my hometown who inscribes any tattoo or mark on their body is deemed to be a bastard, so in a nutshell, tattoo are an abomination for men in my hometown.

And with that, I get to understand a little about our culture and the fact that although other Yoruba people, both male and female, from other home towns can have tattoos, inscriptions, or tribal marks, in ours it's taboo for a man to have any of such, but the women who are encouraged to carry those tattoos and marks are for a purpose: to preserve our culture and remember our roots regardless of where we find ourselves.

It's believed that women, since they're closer to the children, should carry those marks, so when their children see their faces, they'll know a little about their heritage, and being a period when slave trade was active, even if a child is taken to another territory, the tattoo and mark they've seen on their mother's or carried on their own body will make them stand out and easily be recognized as someone from our tribe, meaning such a person's roots can be easily traced.

Aside from this, in other cultures, tattoos mean different things. Like I said, there is one set of Yoruba people I know who usually draw a unique tattoo on their right hand to represent their social status, such as king or chief, and in other tribes, slaves have unique tattoos inscribed on them for easy identification.

Even though I do love and admire tattoos on different people, I still can't have one, and that's because I'm trying to respect the culture and traditions of my hometown that restrict a man from having any form of tattoo or inscription on their body. If not for that, I'd most likely have gotten a tattoo before I became a Christian, and then the religion aspect is now forbidden it as well.

But overall, I'm a big fan of tattoos, admire them a lot, and can't help but gaze at the bodies of those who have them on their bodies, as I see them as something fascinating and unique that makes one stand out and unique.

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This is my entry for the day 25 of the #mayinleo prompt of the #inLeo initiative, if you'd love to participate, you can read days about it in the announcement post.

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That's all my take on these. I hope you enjoyed the read!

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