Tattooing comb
Place: Tahiti & Society Islands
Category: Tools
wood, bone, plant fibre, Tahiti and the Society Islands, l. 11.9 cm (handle), 3 cm (blade), Inv. Oz 438
Humphrey No. 176 to 178: text: see Oz 436
In the specimen Oz 438, the indentation at the handle end is longer than 2 cm, ‘but does not show the sweeping design of Oz 436 which allows that instrument to rest so well on the forefinger’ (Urban 1965: 60). In contrast to the other specimens, the blade, up to 2 cm thick and made of a piece of bone, tapers towards the handle. The original teeth of the blade, about sixteen in all, are all broken off at the base. Gundolf Krüger
Sources
Urban, Manfred, ‘Tahitische Tatauiergeräte. Belegstücke aus der Göttinger Cook-Sammlung’, Baessler-Archiv, Neue Folge, 1965, vol. 13, pp. 59-72.
Related artefacts
Tattooing comb, Inv. Oz 436
Tattooing comb, Inv. Oz 437
Tattooing comb, Inv. Oz 439