Russian criminal tattoos have a complex system of symbols which can give quite detailed information about the wearer. Not only do the symbols carry meaning but the area of the body on which they are placed may be meaningful too.
The story behind a tattoo is the best thing about at a tattoo because that is what makes it special. Tattooing in Russian gang circles and organized crime outfits carries with it a potency and importance that is far stronger than most ‘association ink;’ every mark made in this specific culture has meaning tied directly to its owner. Tattoos are the truth for the Russian mafia. Where they are on the body and what the design is speak volumes.
A newly introduced gang member is thought to commence their career with a tattoo on their chest, often of a rose. Just as the Yakuza are known to do, the higher level Russian mafiosos will keep a trained, modern, hygienically aware tattoo artist in their employ for all ink jobs that need doing; lower down the scale, in prisons for example, it’s grislier. Ink is supposedly made from shoe heels burnt to soot and urine, needle machines composed of guitar strings and electric razors. Typically tattoos are one coloured, simple and blue-ish in tone. They are mostly hidden away by every day wear, being situated on and around the torso.
The meanings and precise symbolism of these tattoos is of course slightly misty and obscure to anybody outside the gang culture, but a few can be discerned. A cathedral with five domes can symbolize five years of imprisonment, for example. Stars, very particularly stylized on the knees, symbolize a man who has never had to kneel before anybody; stars found on the chest however signify a ‘career criminal’.
This unique Russian criminals tattoos and their code meanings. The icons and tribal languages he documented are artful, distasteful, sexually explicit and provocative, reflecting as they do the lives and traditions of convicts. Criminal organization members who break the gang honour code, fail to pay debts, snitch, cheat or any litany of other things can be forcibly tattooed, too; this obviously happens most often in prisons, and the tattoos applied are generally lewd images or derogatory words.
Like in other countries there is a mania for tattoos among criminals, but in Russia they give much more sense for those signs on their bodies. Each even smallest detail can be interpreted as a biography verse from the life of tattoo owner, both police and criminals can just look at the body of the tattooed person and tell all his deeds.
