Colour tattoo of a peacock with feather eyes in a traditional style, covering the upper arm.

Peacock and feathers on an upper arm

Traditional · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A large peacock is shown in profile with its tail fanned behind it, the feathers carrying rows of eye motifs in orange, blue and green. The bird is rendered with bold outlines and smooth colour fills, with shading on the neck and body, and the design wraps around the upper arm. The image is dominated by greens, blues and yellows, with a blue top and a faint small line tattoo visible lower down.

Traditional Upper arm Peacock Peacock feather Feather Bird Eye

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

The bird came up the Varra pass on a Tuesday, tied across the saddle of a carrier who had lost his nerve somewhere below the snowline. I took it off him for two sacks of salt and a promise I never meant to keep, and by the time we reached the cairn at the top, the peacock had decided I belonged to it.

Keep reading

It walked ahead of the mule with its tail dragging through the wet heather, and every feather seemed to turn toward whatever I was carrying. Orange rings, blue pupils, green lashes. My aunt Dorrit, who kept the inn at the foot of the pass, said a peacock's eyes were for keeping account. She counted her coins with them, she claimed, and I laughed until the weather turned and the mule sat down in the snow.

Night came fast on the high ground. I lit the lantern, and the bird settled on a rock beside me and fanned out, and in the light every eye on its tail caught the flame at once. I counted them the way Dorrit would have, one for each mile and one for each debt I owed, and reached a number I did not like. Then I counted the salt. Then the mule. Then myself, which took longer.

At dawn the peacock was gone, and a single feather lay across the path, pointing down toward the valley with its eye still open. I picked it up and found it warm. I tucked it inside my coat and started down, and at every bend of the road someone stood aside to watch me pass, as if they had been expecting me and already knew the tally.