Black and grey butterfly tattoo on the ankle, with wings made of banknotes, a banner reading MOR and a small heart.

Butterfly made of banknotes on an ankle

Traditional · Ankle · Black and grey · Photo

A butterfly tattoo on the side of a foot near the ankle. Its wings are built from banknotes showing the numeral 100, and a banner across the body reads MOR, the word appears cut off. A small heart sits on the banner. The linework is bold, with soft grey shading across the bills and banner and no colour ink.

Traditional Ankle Butterfly Banknote Dollar bill Banner Heart Lettering

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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

Put another log on, Tom, the range has gone to sulk, and I'll tell you about the moth that wanted more. I'll cut the end off the telling the way my grandmother did, for the end of that story was never written down, and anyone who tells you otherwise has been reading the wrong sort of book.

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That was the winter Hollin End lay under snow to the gateposts and the bank's man came up the lane in a motor with the lamps on at noon. Widow Carrick had borrowed against the hayrick, and the hayrick had gone to mice. There was no money in the tin, only a letter from a gentleman in the city who wanted the north field for his pheasants. Then the moths came. Pale ones, out of the stove smoke in January, their wings crisp as new bills and rustling when they moved.

One of them settled on her heel while she slept in the chair by the range. It had a face like a clerk's and a banner across its body with letters on it. It told her it could carry every debt she owed off on its wings, if only she gave it the word it lacked. She said the word was MORE, because that was what she had always wanted and never once been given. The moth took the word, bit the end clean off, and wore what was left like a ribbon. Only a small heart stayed on the banner, stamped there like a seal.

In the spring the north field came up green and the bank's man never came back up the lane. Nobody in Hollin End ever found a single note of the money. But if you look close at the old widow's ankle when she's laid out, which I have, you'll see a butterfly with a shorn word across it and a heart that still hasn't been paid for.