Tattoosday (A Tattoo Blog): Latin

Showing posts with label Latin. Show all posts

Monday, November 12, 2018

Getting the Work Done - Samuel's Latin Leg

Last summer, I spotted a man walking down Broad Street and I had to ask him about his tattoo, I had never quite seen words done like this before:

The tattoo reads, in Latin:

"Amen, amen

dico vobis,

nisi granum

frumenti

cadens in

terram,

mortuum

fuerit, ipsum

solum manet:

si autum

mortuum

fuerit,

multum

frustum

affert"

Samuel, who had this tattoo on his leg, translated this as "Truly, truly, I say unto you, unless a seed falls into the earth and dies, it does alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit."

This is from the Latin Vulgate, the late 4th Century translation of the gospels that became the was the Catholic Church's official text for centuries. The passage hails from the Book of John, Chapter 12, Verse 24.

Samuel said he interprets this to also mean, "Kill your desires, get the work done and you'll prosper," noting that the sentiment is "as Buddhist as it is Christian."

The font used is a customized version meant to recall Gothic lettering and told me this was inked at Spike-O-Matic Tattoo (@spikeomatictattoo) in Madison, Wisconsin.

Thanks to Samuel for sharing his cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

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Monday, July 28, 2014

Sharmeen Has No Regrets About This Beautiful Tattoo (at the Coney Island Mermaid Parade)

Last month at the Coney Island Mermaid Parade, I met Sharmeen briefly and snapped a photo of this amazing tattoo on her upper back:

Sharmeen tells us about this incredible work:

"My tattoo was done by Jed from Vintage Tattoo in Pequannok, NJ. It is a Van Gogh painting that was changed a little bit. Instead of one path like the original painting, it has 2 paths and the one is a windy road. That is to symbolize the windy road in the Robert Frost poem, The Road Not Taken. In the path it says nullum desiderium which in Latin means no regrets."

Thanks to Sharmeen for sharing her cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Monday, June 2, 2014

Christin's Exorcism

I was standing in front of Federal Hall, at the corner of Wall Street and Broad, when I noticed two women sitting nearby. One of them had an epic tattoo on her left thigh, so I introduced myself.

The woman’s name was Christin and she was visiting from Germany. Her friend, whose name I never
caught, was very helpful as an interpreter.

Check out the tattoo:

Christin explained that this is a passage, in Latin, from the Bible. More specifically, it refers to a section concerning exorcism, how, in her words, "the blood will drive out the evil and how everything will end up good.”

You can make out the word "Exorcism" behind the written text. The scratches and blood smears are part of the tattoo design.

The artist responsible is Emrah from Lausbub Tattoo in Heilbronn, Germany. When I reached out to him about the piece, he knew exactly which one I was talking about. "I love this tatt," he said, "but I never ever would do it again ... because of the tiny lettering."

When I asked Christin why she got this huge, intricate tattoo she said (through her friend, interpreting):

"There are two stories: One, the show Supernatural kind of got her on this idea. So that’s what brought her on the general idea of looking into what it is, reading up on it. And she kind of was fucking up her life a little bit much and so this was her way of putting her life back on the proper road so when she looks at it she knows I can’t go down that route again."

Thanks to Christin for sharing her awesome tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

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