Tattoos and Body Modifications
Pontic Steppes
We do not have any evidence of Scythians in the Pontic steppes region being tattooed. However, according to Herodotus (Histories 5.6), the neighboring Thracians highly valued tattoos/tattooing: “To be tattooed is a sign of noble birth, while to bear no such marks is for the baser sort.”
Depictions of Thracians in Greek art often show tattoos of deer, “ladder” decorations, and other geometric shapes on Thracian women.
There are also several pairs of greaves with humanoid faces that show significant geometric tattooing/scarring that are believed to represent Thracians.
Scarification
According to Hippocrates (On Airs, Waters, and Places 20.1), the Scythians practiced cauterization as a form of scarring, although Hippocrates suggests there is a medical/therapeutic explanation for this practice:
You will find the greater part of the Scythians, and all the Nomades, with marks of the cautery on their shoulders, arms, wrists, breasts, hip-joints, and loins, and that for no other reason but the humidity and flabbiness of their constitution, for they can neither strain with their bows, nor launch the javelin from their shoulder owing to their humidity and atony: but when they are burnt, much of the humidity in their joints is dried up, and they become better braced, better fed, and their joints get into a more suitable condition.
Renaut (2024) connects this reported practice to similar scarification therapies among various steppes cultures, including the Ostyaks, Siberians, Samoyeds, and Itelmens (p. 396).
Altai
Many of the individuals in the Pazyryk burials in the Altai Mountains were tattooed, although some of these only became visible/identifiable when the corpses were examined with infrared and x-ray technology.
The tattoos on these bodies primarily depict leaping and twisting hooved animals with fantastical elements–deer with beaks, antlers terminating in flowers or birds' heads–as well as griffins and lurking predators.
Caspari et al. (2025) have attempted to reconstruct some of the tattoos that were only partially extant and/or warped significantly by the mummified nature of the preserved bodies:
Caspari et al. (2025) have also suggested that at least two different tattoo artists' work appear on the Pazyryk mummies. While most of the animals seem to have been the work of a single person, there is an intricate scene of tigers attacking elk that was likely tattooed by a separate individual with a different level of artistic skill (due in part to the use of negative space and arrangement of forms in the scene).
Acupuncture/acupressure usage
One of the Pazyryk mummies (the man from kurgan 2) has two sets of circular tattoos on his lower back and on one foot. Some scholars have postulated that these are meant to serve as a form of acupuncture treatment for rheumatic joint or muscle pain in those areas (Krutak, 2013).