Arabs

Arab peoples are diverse Arabic-speaking communities across the Middle East and North Africa. Tattoos recorded among some Arab and Bedouin groups could express beauty, protection or belonging.

The Bedouin poet Nimr ibn ʿAdwān gives the subject a more personal voice. In an English fragment attributed to him, the tattoos of a beloved woman become jewels that no fortune could buy.

Oh, the neck of my darling! Like that of a gazelle,
Or the white antelope which men hunt on horseback.
Her breasts are adorned by tattooing with gems precious and costly.
Which neither the wealth of Persia nor of Syria could buy.

Nimr, associated with the ʿAdwān of the Jordan region, is remembered for mourning his wife, Wadha. Here bodily decoration becomes part of a story about love and loss. Other portraits show facial, hand and body patterns, reminding us that these communities had varied traditions rather than one tattoo style shared by all Arabs.