Mummies’ Ancient Tattoos Come Under Laser Focus

With a tool often used in the study of dinosaur fossils, scientists uncovered new details in ornate tattoos on the skin of members of the Chancay culture of Peru.

A culture flourished along the central Peruvian coast from about A.D. 900 to 1500. Called the Chancay, they left behind a wealth of cultural remains, including intricate tattoos that are preserved to this day on the skin of mummified individuals.

New details of these tattoos that were previously hidden to the naked eye, including finely traced lines, were described in a study published on Monday. After illuminating the mummies with laser-stimulated fluorescence, or L.S.F., an imaging tool that until now had never been applied to tattoos, scientists discovered lines 0.1 to 0.2 millimeters wide, narrower than work produced by most modern tattoo needles.

“We were shocked by just how fine the tattoo lines were in our L.S.F. images,” said Michael Pittman, an assistant professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and an author of the new study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in an email. “We immediately knew that what we were seeing was special.”

The mummies featured in the new study had been buried at the Cerro Colorado cemetery, and were rediscovered in 1981. Their tattoos are roughly 1,000 years old and display ornate geometric designs, reminiscent of scales or vines, as well as an amorphous animal with a curled tail.

The Chancay have long been known for high levels of craftsmanship across their material culture, and left elaborate markings in far more than their tattoos, said Aaron Deter-Wolf, a prehistoric archaeologist at the Tennessee Division of Archaeology who specializes in ancient tattoos and was not involved in the study.