Mentawai Tattoos

The Mentawai are an ancient tribe that for thousands of years has lived on Siberut Island. Although 19th century Christian and Muslim missionaries converted most of the Mentawai living on the neighboring southern islands of Sipora and the Pagai’s (which are relatively flat), the traditional culture of the Mentawai living on rugged (and somewhat mountainous) Siberut has remained relatively intact. The Mentawai said that their tattoos (titi) allow their ancestors to recognize them after death. More importantly, however, many forms of tattooing are specifically believed to protect their owners from evil spirits lurking in the jungle.

Tattoos are applied by a designated tattoo artist called a sipaniti or “man who makes the needle” at specific stages in life. Traditionally, when a girl or boy reached the age of seven, they received their back tattoos; now this practice begins in the mid-teens, if at all. Then, after waiting one or two years, their upper arms and the backs of their hands were marked. Next, the tattooing of the upper thighs and legs was executed (note: traditionally these marks were made just before marriage), and followed by the intricate tattoos of the chest and neck. The final stage of tattooing, which usually commenced after the individual reached forty years of age, was completed when the calves, shins, and the forearms were tattooed.

Of course, different Mentawai clans observed their own customs when it came to the different stages of tattooing. Bai Lau Lau, Aman Lau Lau’s wife, who is from a different region of Siberut told me that her hands were tattooed first (all in one day); then she waited one year and her chest and back were tattooed (all in one day)!

Traditionally, Mentawai tattoo artists sometimes used a sharpened piece of bark taken from the karai tree as their skin-plying tool. Others used a lemon thorn set into a small bamboo stick which was hand-tapped into the skin with a wooden mallet. Among the indigenous Atayal and Paiwan of Taiwan, and the Kalinga of the Philippines, thorns of the mountain orange tree were used in this capacity. However, the coastal peoples of Papua New Guinea, who are essentially Polynesian, also used the lemon thorn as a tattooing tool. ( source: https://larskrutak.com/titi-spirit-tattoos-of-the-mentawai-shaman/ )