About the Cover

Cover: Illustrated pps. 3-4 extracted from a white folded parabaik of a Burmese tattoo manuscript, ca.1900. Artist unknown. White local handmade Shan Paper. Handwritten Burmese and Pali scripts. Black and red vermilion ink, pencil, lacquer. Dimensions: W. 29.5 cm; L. 602 cm. 108 pages recto-verso. Courtesy of the Burma Art Collection at Northern Illinois University. Gift of the Burma Studies Group.

Cover image editing: Chloe Insley, Center for Burma Studies.
Manuscript digitization: Donn V. Hart Southeast Asia Collection. https://sea.lib.niu.edu/islandora/object/SEAImages%3ANIUManuscripts

The two oblong images adorning the cover of this issue came from a traditional Burmese tattoo manual (108 pages, recto-verso), alternating designs and texts. These specific pages present a series of “red cat” designs prescribed to protect against firearm and artillery projectiles; and also edged weaponry. These images are accompanied with handwritten lines of Burmese text in black ink elaborating on the function of these tattoos and addressing their design as well their proper placement on the body; with mantra or magic formulae surrounding the designs alternating in Pali and Burmese, to be inked or recited while inking the person. The parabaik was clearly written to guide a tattoo master in both the usage and meaning of these specific tattoos.

According to this manual, the potency of the tattoo depends on how carefully the prescribed ritual is strictly followed when the tattoo master inks the body. It is reiterated in the two text lines under the pictures of the nine red cats. It includes also instructions as to the preparation of the ink which is made from nine different ingredients, including, e.g., black smoke soot and plant extracts from betel leaves for black ink, while the red ink is a mercuric sulphide (a cinnabar-based) vermillion pigment. The details of correct behavior within the sacred space created when the tattoo is being administered, are also iterated: e.g., none of the participants may enter or leave during the tattooing process.

The placement of the tattoo on the body is also most important, as is specified in the lower page’s text lines; i.e., for each of the top row of four red cats in black and red containing the magic formula of the four letters CA, DA, BA, WA (from left to right), the first cat image associated with the letter CA has to be tattooed on the top of the left foot; while the second cat image with the letter DA has to be tattooed on the top of the right foot. The third cat image with the letter BA has to be tattooed on the top of the right hand, while the fourth cat image associated with WA has to be on the top of the left hand. The bodily placement of the final two brotherhood red cats with square diagrams and Burmese numbers from 1 to 7 is unspecified, while the small red cats located in the lowest left corner need to be tattooed on the thumb. Before inking these tattoos, a traditional kadaw pwe offering of 30 different elements needs to be prepared.

Dating probably to the end of the Nineteenth Century, this parabaik extends through 108 pages within a continuous strip of white paper folded in concertina fashion. It was locally made and bound with a black lacquer cover. The author probably later drew in penciled addenda, but used red and black ink for the images and the texts.

This parabaik was part of the bequest to the Burma Studies Group by the American diplomat Paul J. Bennett who lived in Burma from 1971 to 1973. Along with more than fifty others, this manuscript is now preserved in Rare Book and Special Collections at the NIU Founders Memorial Library. It can be viewed online in high resolution through the Southeast Asia Digital Library under the reference GT 2345. P866 1900a.

Catherine Raymond, curator of the Burma Art Collection at Northern Illinois University.