Editing Tattoo (section)

==== Forcible tattooing for identification ====
[[File:Auschwitz survivor displays tattoo detail.jpg|thumb|An identification tattoo on a survivor of the [[Auschwitz concentration camp]]]]
A well-known example is the [[Nazi Germany|Nazi]] practice of forcibly tattooing [[Nazi concentration camps|concentration camp]] inmates with identification numbers during [[the Holocaust]] as part of [[Identification in Nazi camps#Numbers|the Nazis' identification system]], beginning in fall 1941.<ref>{{Cite news |title=Tattoos and Numbers: The System of Identifying Prisoners at Auschwitz |url=https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007056 |website=www.ushmm.org}}</ref> The [[SS]] introduced the practice at [[Auschwitz concentration camp]] in order to identify the bodies of registered prisoners in the concentration camps. During registration, guards would tattoo each prisoner with a number, usually on the left forearm, but sometimes on the chest<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |orig-date=ca. 6th May 1945 |author=Photograph taken by Donald R. Ornitz |title=Survivors in a barracks in Mauthausen. Note the tattoo on the chest of the man in the left foreground |url=https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa6838 |website=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum |type=black and white photograph}}</ref> or stomach.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web |orig-date=1945 |title=American film about Nazi atrocities at concentration camps shown at Nuremberg Trials [also called Concentration Camps in Germany, 1939-1945] |url=https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn616441 |website=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum |series=Archives of the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal |publisher=U.S. Army Signal Corps |type=Black and white 35mm nitrate film [digitised]}}</ref> Of the Nazi concentration camps, only Auschwitz put tattoos on inmates.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Tattoos and Numbers: The System of Identifying Prisoners at Auschwitz |url=https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/tattoos-and-numbers-the-system-of-identifying-prisoners-at-auschwitz |access-date=11 October 2019 |website=encyclopedia.ushmm.org}}</ref> Prisoners found with tattoos in [[Mauthausen concentration camp]]<ref name=":2" /> and [[Buchenwald concentration camp]]<ref name=":3" /> upon liberation were presumably transported from Auschwitz by [[Death marches during the Holocaust|death march]]. The tattoo was the prisoner's camp number, sometimes with a special symbol added: some [[Jew]]s had a triangle, and [[Romani people|Romani]] had the letter "Z" (from German ''{{linktext|Zigeuner}}'' for 'Gypsy'). In May 1944, Jewish men received the letters "A" or "B" to indicate a particular series of numbers.

As early as the [[Zhou dynasty|Zhou]], Chinese authorities would employ facial tattoos as a punishment for certain crimes or to mark prisoners or slaves.{{citation needed|date=May 2025}}

[[File:Mark of a deserter.jpg|thumb|upright|Tattoo marking a [[desertion|deserter]] from the [[British Army]]; skin removed post-mortem]]

During the [[Roman Empire]], gladiators and slaves were tattooed: exported slaves were tattooed with the words "tax paid", and it was a common practice to tattoo "fugitive" (denoted by the letters "FUG") on the foreheads of runaway slaves.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Pitt Rivers Museum Body Arts {{!}} Prisoner's tag |url=http://web.prm.ox.ac.uk/bodyarts/index.php/body-arts-and-lifecycles/adulthood/105-prisoners-tag.html |website=web.prm.ox.ac.uk}}</ref> Owing to the [[Bible|Biblical]] strictures against the practice,<ref>[[Leviticus 19]]:28</ref> Emperor [[Constantine the Great|Constantine I]] banned tattooing the face around AD&nbsp;330, and the [[Second Council of Nicaea]] banned all body markings as a [[Paganism|pagan]] practice in AD&nbsp;787.<ref name="Mayor">{{Cite news |last=Mayor |first=Adrienne |date=March–April 1999 |title=People Illustrated |volume=52 |work=Archaeological Institute of America |issue=2 |url=http://www.archaeology.org/9903/abstracts/tattoo.html}}</ref>