The Tattoo Encyclopedia : A Guide to Choosing Your Tattoo

Rating:
Summary: A Good Book For Background Information...
Review: If you're looking for a book filled with color pictures and image ideas for your next tattoo, then you may want to consider looking elsewhere. However, if you want to get more of a historical background on the various images and symbols used in tattoo art throughout the ages then you won't be disappointed. The "Tattoo Encyclopedia" is an interesting catalog of all the world images, symbols and designs used in tattoo art throughout the centuries. While most of the entries are just a few sentences long, it gives facinating trivia on a wide variety of images from Chinese Dragons to the Illuminati to the Claddagh to the Triskelion. It would have been nice to have pictures accompanying all the entries but I guess that would be asking a bit too much. Useful strictly as a reference book and not as a book on design, the "Tattoo Encyclopedia" is a good buy for those curious about the origins and meanings of tattoo symbols.

Rating:
Summary: A Good Book For Background Information...
Review: If you're looking for a book filled with color pictures and image ideas for your next tattoo, then you may want to consider looking elsewhere. However, if you want to get more of a historical background on the various images and symbols used in tattoo art throughout the ages then you won't be disappointed. The "Tattoo Encyclopedia" is an interesting catalog of all the world images, symbols and designs used in tattoo art throughout the centuries. While most of the entries are just a few sentences long, it gives facinating trivia on a wide variety of images from Chinese Dragons to the Illuminati to the Claddagh to the Triskelion. It would have been nice to have pictures accompanying all the entries but I guess that would be asking a bit too much. Useful strictly as a reference book and not as a book on design, the "Tattoo Encyclopedia" is a good buy for those curious about the origins and meanings of tattoo symbols.

Rating:
Summary: No Latin, Just tattoos
Review: Now if you ask me, and a lot of folk interested in the traditional art of body alteration do now and again, this here book is the one you need if you are researching the various tattoos from which you are going to select one. Back when I was coming up in Chesterfield County we had us a circus that came to town every autumn. It was the Chester T. Smalley Traveling Circus Extravaganza and Freak Show from Springfield, Missouri. They would pass through every year and put on the same show and sell the same stale peanuts and same sickly sweet cotton candy and the same performers would do the same tricks and they would parade around the same set of mules painted to look like zebras... and we loved it. We'd plunk down our two bits an go in and have a good ole' time, then we'd go out to the side show and look at the freaks and play the games and buy more stale peanuts and sickly sweet cotton candy.

Out on the side show circuit there was Wally the Dog Faced Boy who was some kid from Illinois who kind of had droopy eyes and a sad look and they would add a little makeup and put a dog collar on him and chain him to the wall and charge a nickel to go in and take a look. That was my favorite, but the second best thing was Princess Lucrecia the Tattooed Woman. She was a big ole strappin' girl off the farm with arms the size of fence posts and a big gold tooth right up front. She was so hefty that she usually perspired pretty profusely. She had her about three tattoos and they was each the size of a fifty cent piece or smaller. Back then, that was still pretty impressive... but now days everybody and their cousin has more tattoos than that.

See, back when I was coming up the world of tattoos was limited to Merchant Marines, Truck Drivers, and Denis Shanks. Denis was a farm hand from down near the river bottoms and he would work right through the harvest season to make enough money to spend the winter getting new tattoos. He had so many that there wasn't much normal skin left except right around his eyes and over by his left ear. He used to scare the kids pretty good when he walked down the street and once, right about mid-summer he was working bare chested in a hay field and exposing his entire upper-body collection and a bunch of us boys went over and hid in the thicket and commenced to tally up all the tattoos we could see. We got to 148 before Farmer Mills saw us and hollered over that if we didn't scat he was going to go get the shotgun and put a could of rocksalt in our bottoms... so we high tailed it out of there fast.

Anyhow, Princess Lucrecia had her some tattoos and I can still see them very clearly in my mind's eye. I leafed through this here book and found two of the designs, but the third one I never did find. It was a circular thing that looked kind of like the lid to a mason jar turned over on its side a little, with a vine and a flower (or maybe a snake) wrapped around it, and the words "Abusus non tollit usum" which is Latin for "Wrong use does not preclude proper use" I got no idea what that was supposed to mean, but I can still see it there on her shank, with sweat rivulets running across it. Cost me a nickel to get in there and take a peek at that each year, so you sure as shootin' I'm going to remember.

Get this book if you need to check on tattoo designs, but be forewarned that it ain't got much on Latin mottos so you'll need to look elsewhere if you're looking for them.

Rating:
Summary: Cover art
Review: The images on the cover of the book are more interesting that those inside. While the dictionary definitions of many symbols are interesting, there are few images to go along with them, and those that are included are mostly crudely hand drawn. Personally, I was looking for precise images to work off and found little help here. If you are looking for verbage to accompany a design, this is pretty good. If you are looking for a design with verbage, save your money for another.

Rating:
Summary: Cover art
Review: The images on the cover of the book are more interesting that those inside. While the dictionary definitions of many symbols are interesting, there are few images to go along with them, and those that are included are mostly crudely hand drawn. Personally, I was looking for precise images to work off and found little help here. If you are looking for verbage to accompany a design, this is pretty good. If you are looking for a design with verbage, save your money for another.

Rating:
Summary: interesting
Review: This book gives interesting history on just about any popular tattoo you see around these days. It is very interesting to know that certain popular tattoo art dates back to when it does, and holds a special meaning in certain cultures. You might want to pick up this book if you are interested in finding out some important details about a tattoo you get before you get it, but it may require extra research as the descriptions in the book are very brief.

Rating:
Summary: interesting
Review: This book gives interesting history on just about any popular tattoo you see around these days. It is very interesting to know that certain popular tattoo art dates back to when it does, and holds a special meaning in certain cultures. You might want to pick up this book if you are interested in finding out some important details about a tattoo you get before you get it, but it may require extra research as the descriptions in the book are very brief.

Rating:
Summary: A must have!
Review: This is a fantastic resource for anybody who's thinking about getting a tattoo. In fact, I would go so far as to say that you shouldn't get a tattoo without reading this book. You can look up tattoo symbols by name, by type, or just thumb through the whole thing looking at all the fantastic illustrations. I bought the book when I decided the time had come to take the tattoo plunge, but realized I had no idea what design I would want or would look good. This book helped me choose a design I would never have thought of by myself. Even if you're not considering a tattoo yourself, the entries make for fascinating reading. Every tattoo shop should have one of these! I'm waiting for the sequel on jewelry!