Two black and grey traditional anchor tattoos with rope wrapped around the shanks, one on the top of each bare foot, resting on grass.

Anchor and rope tattoos on both feet

Traditional · Other · Black and grey · Photo

Two matching anchors with rope coiled around their shanks sit on the tops of a pair of bare feet. The bold outlines are filled with black and grey shading, giving the rope and metal a solid, three-dimensional look. The feet rest on green grass in daylight, with the anchors centred on each foot and a pair of rolled denim trouser legs visible at the top left.

Find an artist for this

Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

You learn the rope before you learn the sea. Ruth Cardew taught you that on the Falmouth quay the summer you were fifteen, her hands moving over three-strand hemp faster than you could follow, until she slapped a coil into your arms and said, 'Now you try, and don't let the bight kink.' By October you could whip an eye splice blind, and the Mary Glyn needed a boy who could.

Keep reading

The passage was nine weeks out to Newfoundland with salt cod and coal in the hold. The spare anchor rode on the starboard bow, its shank wrapped in tarred line so it wouldn't chafe the planking. Somewhere south of the Grand Banks the fog came down thick as wet wool, and the mate ordered the chain paid out. You felt the cable sing through the hawse pipe and knew the bottom was close, forty fathoms of grey water under a keel nobody aboard had charted.

The anchor held. You remember the strain in your shoulders and Ruth at the wheel saying nothing at all, which was how she praised. When the fog lifted there was a black rock to port, and a gull sat on it looking entirely unimpressed with the lot of you.

Back in Falmouth the holds were emptied and the Mary Glyn went up the slip for caulking. Ruth walked the length of the quay with you, her boots loud on the stones, and stopped by the bollards where the old hemp lay coiled in a tarred heap. She lifted a length of it, turned it over, and handed it to you. 'Keep it flaked,' she said, 'and it'll keep you.'

More like this

Two people holding hands, each with a traditional-style anchor tattoo on the inner forearm, with black linework and orange-red accents.
Matching anchor tattoos on two forearms
Two people holding hands show matching traditional anchor tattoos on their forearms, each with orange accents and a rope detail.
Matching anchor tattoos on two forearms
Small black fine line tattoo of an anchor looped through an infinity symbol on the inside of a wrist.
Infinity and anchor on a wrist
Anchor tattoo filled with pink and red flowers and leaves on the back of a hand, resting on kraft paper.
Floral anchor on the back of a hand
Two small solid black anchor tattoos, one on each of two ankles, resting on a patterned rug.
Small anchor tattoos on two ankles
Black and grey photograph of two hands held together, each with a small fine line anchor tattoo with dotwork detail on the back of the hand.
Matching anchor tattoos on two hands
Close view of a small black fine line anchor tattoo on the back of a bare heel, with both bare feet standing on green carpet.
Small anchor tattoo on a heel
Two black and grey tattoos on the backs of a pair of hands, a compass rose on the left and an anchor with a ship's wheel on the right, in a traditional style.
Compass and anchor tattoos on the hands
Traditional style colour tattoos on the tops of two feet, showing a swallow over a birdcage and a ring with a diamond, with banner lettering and small flowers.
Swallow, birdcage and banners on two feet
Two black ink calf tattoos on a beach: a ship's wheel on a man's left leg and an anchor on a woman's right leg, each with script wording above and below.
Ship's wheel and anchor calf tattoos
Black linework world map outlines tattooed across the tops of both feet, with a red string anklet on one ankle.
World map outlines on both feet
Fine line black tattoo of a small two-masted sailboat on the inner wrist, with a fist raised above it against a wooden surface.
Small sailboat on an inner wrist

From the plentytattoo archive, uploaded by a user. Is this your work? Ask for credit or removal.