Colour tattoo of a sugar skull wearing a gold crown, with diamond-shaped eyes, on the upper arm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Sugar skull with crown on upper arm

Neo-trad · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A sugar skull wearing a gold crown sits on the inner upper arm, with diamond-shaped gems set in its eye sockets and a heart-shaped motif on the cheek. The skull is outlined in bold black lines and decorated with ornate scrollwork, flowers and dots. Warm orange and yellow tones dominate, with green, red and pink accents on a pale skin background against a dark backdrop.

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

Cook Tomas had been boiling sugar since the ship left Cadiz, and by the time the fleet reached the Bay of Campeche every pot in the galley was sticky to the rafters. The sailors called him the Sweetmaker. On the feast of the dead he moulded skulls for them, one for each man lost at sea, and set them in a row along the oak table so the living could eat the dead's share.

Keep reading

That year there was one skull too many. Nobody had died on the crossing, so Tomas pressed the last mould full of leftover syrup and stood it on the windowsill to harden. By morning it had a crown of spun sugar on its head, gold as a ship's lamp, and two eyes of clear candy that caught the light like cut glass.

The men said it was a bad omen. The boy who scrubbed pans said it was the king of the galley, come to collect his tax of sugar. Tomas said nothing and nibbled a heart from its cheek, which he later admitted tasted of salt and Spain.

When the fleet anchored at Veracruz, a stranger climbed aboard asking for her husband, a purser who had gone ashore and never come back. She looked at the crowned skull for a long time. Then she took it, pressed a coin into Tomas's palm, and walked back down the gangway. The husband never returned, but every feast of the dead after that, a sugar skull with a golden crown appeared on a windowsill in the port, and nobody in the galley ever claimed the credit.

More like this

Two colour sugar skull tattoos wearing grey crowns, one on each calf, in a bold neo-traditional style.
Twin sugar skulls with crowns on calves
Colour traditional tattoo of an hourglass with a skull, red roses, leaves and an eye with falling tears, on a lower leg.
Traditional hourglass with skull and eye on a calf
Black and grey dotwork tattoo on the upper arm, a hamsa hand with an eye in its palm merged with a skull.
Hamsa and skull on the upper arm
Black and grey skull with a crown of roses tattooed on the side of a finger, shaded in stippled dotwork.
Skull and roses on a finger
Colour traditional tattoo on a calf showing a pizza slice in place of a face, framed by thick dark wavy hair and a teal bow.
Pizza slice and wavy hair on a calf
Colour traditional tattoo of a sugar skull with a red rose across its forehead and pink flower eyes, on a forearm.
Sugar skull with red rose on a forearm
Black and grey dotwork tattoo of an owl face beneath a crown, with ornate scrollwork below, on the forearm.
Owl with crown and ornamental scrollwork
Black and grey dotwork skull tattoo with an eye in a triangle and heart-shaped rays, on the thigh.
Skull and eye tattoo on a thigh
Traditional style tattoo of a snarling black panther head wearing an orange crown, with yellow eyes, red mouth and fangs, shown on a forearm in two side by side photos.
Crowned panther head on a forearm
Traditional style tattoo of a skull pierced by a dagger, surrounded by flowers and green leaves, on the forearm.
Skull and dagger on a forearm
Traditional tattoo of a shaded skull with a green cobra and a second snake coiled around it, with red drips, on a forearm.
Skull with cobra and snake on a forearm
Traditional tattoo of a shaded skull with a bouquet of colourful flowers and green leaves spilling from its top, on a forearm.
Skull with flower bouquet on a forearm

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