Maori Facial Tattoos

Tā moko is the permanent marking or "tattoo" as traditionally practised by Maori people, the indigenous people of  New Zealand

Tohunga-tā-moko (tattooists) were considered tapu, or untouchable and sacred

Ink and watercolour print by Thomas Chambers based on watercolour sketch by Sidney Parkinson from 1784

Painting by Tamati Waka Nene by Gottfried Lindauer 1890

Polynesian Facial Tattoos

Portrait and profile views of “Tepano,”  from Easter Island 1880s. 

Engravings after the drawing of Hjalmar Stolpe, a Swedish ethnographer

Photographs of Tepano 1880s

Tribal Facial Tattoos from Papua New Guinea 

Hula facial tattooing, ca. 1915. The stepped tattoos (lakatoi) on the woman’s cheeks and nose note that her father participated in several successful trading voyages. However, some scholars believe that this design evolved from the concept of an elbowed bird’s wing, possibly a predatorial bird. The motif on the throat denotes that the woman is married Traditionally, tattoo artists were almost always female and different women were employed for tattooing specific parts of the body.