Solid black tribal-style ram with a spiral horn tattooed on the upper arm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Tribal ram on upper arm

Upper arm · Black and grey · Photo

A solid black tribal-style ram is shown in profile, with a spiral-shaped horn curling above its head and sweeping black bands behind it. The linework is bold and filled with solid black ink, with no shading or grey tones visible. The design fills the upper arm against a plain skin background.

Upper arm Ram Horn Spiral Animal

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 ram came down the escarpment the morning the second sun rose behind the tailings, and I knew from the set of his horn that he meant to take the water from us. Ninety years of breeding on Caddis Station had given us animals built for thin air and low gravity, and this one carried a spiral of bone that curled over his skull like a clock spring wound too tight.

Keep reading

Mother Ines kept the flock before me. She taught me to read horns the way the old ones read a sky: each turn a winter survived, each groove a bad year on the grid. Our ram was the last of the line that still bore the hard black coat her grandfather's engineers had printed into the stock, and he walked with dark bands of hide sweeping back from his shoulders as if he were already running.

I didn't fight him. I opened the sluice at the reservoir, let him drink first, and sat on the cracked concrete while he lowered that heavy head to the surface. The spiral on his brow caught the light and threw a shadow across the water like a crooked wheel turning slowly on its axle.

When he lifted his muzzle, the brand on his flank had gone pale with the damp, and the flock came down the slope behind him in a long, patient line. Ines would have said the ram chose the water, not the other way round. I wrote the count in the ledger under her name, and beneath the date I drew a small curl, the same shape as his horn.