Tattoo

[Alanus]

I believe Andy nailed it. Also, the link to the article on the "Ice Man" is not relevant to later European cultures in the sense it was describing a Neolithic example from a Pre Indo-European culture. Tattoos appear to stem from an East Central Asian connection to shamanism. European cultures inclined toward a "gods" concept, and body-marking as a form of art or veneration is "conspicuous by its absence," to steal Gibbon's phrase.