Roses are definitely the most used flower in tattoo art history. Originally the rose has appeared in Persia and From ancient Greece and Rome, Then on the other side of the globe through Japan and Polynesia finishing in the south and north America roses are known part of everyday iconography and therefore a big part of tattoo culture. Roses are a Complex flower with a lot of different variations and they are synonymous with beauty and grace. Its yin-yang experience is completed with the thorns. In general, we can say that it can represent beauty, joy, and purity combined with defense, thoughtlessness, and danger. In the first half of the twentieth-century roses gain popularity among the sailors (like many other tattoos at the time) as a dedication of their wives, girlfriends, sisters, and mothers.
We can say that roses got some common meanings like love, passion, beauty, devotion, and toughness (thorns). Also, the color has a story of its own and different tones have different meanings. White-purity, Red-love, Yellow-joy, Pink- feminity, grace, Black-death and sorrow, Orange-new beginnings, Purple – royalty, wealth, Blue-Fantasy.
It’s a simple combination that can be used with the roses flower for a bigger and deeper meaning. For example: If you combine the red rose with someone or something that you love and admire or black rose with someone that you’ve lost you can end up with a tattoo motive with a deep and profound meaning despite the contrasting elements that you’ve used.
We got a variety of styles that are used to interpret the rose tattoo today. From geometric thru realistic, black and gray, tribal… Like with all other tattoos you can add elements that gonna expand and explain your rose tattoo with your personal preference and touch. Basic used combinations are Rose and skull (overcoming something hard and bad), Rose and butterfly (Feminine beauty), Rose and cross (dedication to god and religion), Rose and heart (True love) and many others.
We can say that rose flower with its beauty and aroma is holding her big part of the tattoo art surviving all the changes in styles and tattoo fashion in modern times and its gonna stay like one of the foundations of the tattoo culture in general
