Gorgeous, Hidden Animal Tattoos Discovered on a More Than 2,000-Year-Old ‘Ice Mummy’ by Using Digital Imaging

The ancient tattoos, which would have required trained artistry and hours of work, would be difficult for even modern tattooists to produce, a new study suggests

Margherita Bassi | Daily Correspondent

August 4, 2025

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Tigers, stags and a leopard twist around each other, the animals’ stylized and intricate details spread in ink across a woman’s forearm. On her hand is the delicate outline of a bird with a fluffy tail. It sounds like something you might see from a tattoo artist today, but these designs appear to be preserved on a more than 2,000-year-old “ice mummy” from Siberia’s Pazyryk culture.

The Pazyryk culture existed in the Altai Mountains—which extend through parts of Russia, China, Mongolia and Kazakhstan today—from the 6th to 2nd centuries B.C.E. Pazyryk people were horse riders associated with the nomadic Scythian culture, and they’re now known for carving petroglyphs and building frozen burial mounds called kurgans.

In a study published last week in the journal Antiquity, archaeologists used high-resolution digital imaging techniques to analyze the tattoos of a mummified Pazyryk woman like never before, shedding light on the craftsmanship and tools that such an artistic endeavor would have required.

“The elaborate figural tattoos that adorn the human bodies preserved for more than 2,000 years in the Altai Mountains are among the most iconic archaeological finds of Inner Asia,” the researchers write in the study.

While the long-term preservation of skin is exceedingly rare, the deep Pazyryk burials in the Altai Mountains are encased in permafrost, turning some individuals into “ice mummies.” In these cases, their skin is preserved, but it often is darkened and dried out.

As a result, the Pazyryk woman’s “tattoos weren’t even visible when she was first excavated, because the skin had already darkened,” Gino Caspari, an archaeologist at the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and senior author of the study, tells National Geographic’s Annie Roth. “We knew there had to be more beneath the surface.”

Caspari and his colleagues produced a 3D scan of the tattooed woman, who died when she was approximately 50 years old, using high-resolution digital near-infrared photography. This approach brought to light tattoos on her forearms and hands.

“We have herbivores being hunted by tigers and leopards, and in one case by a griffin, and on the hands, we have depictions of birds,” Caspari tells New Scientist’s Chris Simms. “Due to their age and the vivid art style, the Pazyryk tattoos are something really special.”

The team collaborated with modern tattoo artists to investigate the kind of tools and techniques the Pazyryk artist would have used. The fact that the tattoos on the right forearm are more technical and feature greater detail than those on the other arm suggests two possible scenarios: Either two different tattoo artists carried out the work, or the same tattooist completed some of the tattoos after improving their skills. Regardless, the craft clearly necessitated training.

“If I was guessing, it was probably four and half hours for the lower half of the right arm and another five hours for the upper part,” Daniel Riday, a co-author of the study and an expert in ancient tattoos who recreates them on himself with historical approaches, tells the BBC’s Georgina Rannard. “That’s a solid commitment from the person. Imagine sitting on the ground in the steppe where there’s wind blowing all that time,” he adds. “It would need to be performed by a person who knows health and safety, who knows the risks of what happens when the skin is punctured.”

The tattoo artist or artists likely used more than one tool, including a multi-point tool, and applied burnt plant material or soot as pigment. The technique is comparable to “hand poking” today, but even modern tattooists would find it challenging to achieve “such crisp and uniform results, especially with hand-poked methods,” the team writes in the paper.

In a statement, Caspari explains that previous research on ancient tattoos was mostly based on hand-drawings of the original tattoos rather than scans, and it focused on the style and symbolism of the art—in other words, it examined the “overarching social context” instead of the “individuals,” he says.

“I’ve been a fan of this research team’s work for a very long time,” Matt Lodder, an art historian at the University of Essex in England who was not involved in the study, tells Live Science’s Kristina Killgrove. “Ultimately, these methods render tattoos indexes of individual lives as well as cultural belief systems,” he explains, “and allow us to think about ancient tattoos as specific moments of creative practice.”

Margherita Bassi | Read More

Margherita Bassi is a freelance journalist and trilingual storyteller. Her work has appeared in publications including BBC Travel, Discover magazine, Live Science, Atlas Obscura and Hidden Compass.