History lesson.

Therapeutic
The earliest (known) tattoos were amulets protecting the wearer against pain or danger.
The oldest known tattooed human is Otzi the “Iceman”, a 5,200-year-old mummy found near frozen in the Alps near the Italian-Austrian border. Otzi wears 57 dots and small crosses over his lower spine and on the joints of his right knee and ankle. Because on these spots Otzi’s bones were strained and deteriorated, scientists speculate that the tattoos were applied there to alleviate and/or ward off pain.
In Egypt, tattooing was a female practice. Figurines from 4,000 B.C. and female mummies from 2,000 B.C. display tattoos conspicuously concentrated on the abdomen and thighs. They are probably not a prostitute’s protection against sexually transmitted diseases, but rather amulets for women during pregnancy and childbirth. Imagine a net of dark dots that, as the pregnancy progressed, expanded around the belly/baby. Other images are of the deity Bes, the protector of laboring women. It is not known if this was common among all women or reserved for the privileged.
Social status
Tattoos were also marks of high distinction.
The 2,400-year-old frozen mummies of a Scythian man and woman (found in Siberia) show elaborate tattoos of mythical creatures all over the body. In 450 B.C., the Greek historian Herodotus explained Scythian and Thracian tattoos as marks of nobility, adding that the lack of tattoos betrayed low birth.
Ancient Nubian (south of Egypt) mummies from between 2,000-1,500 B.C. have blue tattoos. Slightly more recent representations of male Libyan war leaders show geometrical tattoos on arms and legs.
The ancient Briton tribes also wore tattoos of animal creatures as marks of high status. The Romans called one such tribe “Picts,” meaning “painted ones”.