Motif · motif_tiger
Tiger
1 attested · 4 promoted3 sources · T2
What the research says
motifs_seed- Category
- animal
- Variants
- crawling tiger; tiger head; tiger with chrysanthemum
- Common styles
- american traditional; neo traditional; realism
- Common themes
- nature
- Cultural flags
- the symbolic edge is Japanese-context; the tradition is routed to T11.10
Provenance
3 resolvediNKPPL Tattoo Magazine
Tattoo magazine style guide whose symbol list is the densest single-page motif-meaning evidence found for this batch. Verbatim: "Dragons, as symbols of wisdom and self-assurance, carp symbolizing courage, tigers as symbols of fearlessness, snakes as symbols of protection from misfortune and illness, peonies as symbols of wealth and prosperity, cherry blossoms as symbols of a warrior's short life and fleeting youth". Its bullet list adds "Koi carp swimming upstream - represents resilience and invincibility", "Tiger - symbolizes fearlessness", "Peony - represents life success", "Sakura (cherry blossom) - symbolizes sacrifice and obedience" and "Rat - represents fertility". IMPORTANT LIMIT: every claim here is JAPANESE-CONTEXT and describes a living tradition; each edge drawn from it is scoped to that context and flagged, and the tradition itself is T11.10's, not a motif node's.
industry source · retrieved 2026-08-29
Tattoo Life Crew, Tattoo Life
Tattoo magazine gallery feature. Verbatim: "The starting subjects are the most classic animals of the traditional Japanese style, from tigers, to frogs, to snakes and all those animals of the mythological tradition that have always accompanied tattooing." Cited to establish 'animals' as a working subject grouping in the trade and to attest tiger, frog and snake as members of it.
industry source · published 2023-09-27 · retrieved 2026-08-29
Maggie Whales interviewing the tattoo artist Mors, Tattoo Life
Artist interview. The interviewer describes the subjects Mors tattoos as "roses, skulls, eagles, panthers… and mandalas"; Mors himself lists his classic design panel as "tigers, panthers, snakes, roses, mandalas, torch, eagles" and says "I do love animals in general: big cats, tigers, panthers, eagles, snakes, moth." A practising artist naming a working motif vocabulary in his own words - used for motif EXISTENCE and style association only, never for symbolic meaning, which the interview does not discuss.
artist interview · published 2024-04-15 · retrieved 2026-08-29
Related concepts
5 linksFrequently used in · 3
- strength 0.50promoted · not an independent attestationresearched
Promoted from motifs_seed.common_styles of motif_tiger ('american traditional'). Provenance inherited from the parent row(s): source_inkppl_japanese_style; source_tattoolife_japanese_animals; source_tattoolife_mors_traditional; the first is carried in source_id. No new fact: this edge restates a value already present in the corpus. STRENGTH 0.5 set by the T11.11c rule: this pairing is asserted by ONE parent row's association column and by no second row; the pack's scale reads 0.5 as 'context-dependent'. Inputs are corpus counts only - no source count, tier or confidence is used.
- strength 0.50promoted · not an independent attestationresearched
Promoted from motifs_seed.common_styles of motif_tiger ('neo traditional'). Provenance inherited from the parent row(s): source_inkppl_japanese_style; source_tattoolife_japanese_animals; source_tattoolife_mors_traditional; the first is carried in source_id. No new fact: this edge restates a value already present in the corpus. STRENGTH 0.5 set by the T11.11c rule: this pairing is asserted by ONE parent row's association column and by no second row; the pack's scale reads 0.5 as 'context-dependent'. Inputs are corpus counts only - no source count, tier or confidence is used.
- strength 0.50promoted · not an independent attestationresearched
Promoted from motifs_seed.common_styles of motif_tiger ('realism'). Provenance inherited from the parent row(s): source_inkppl_japanese_style; source_tattoolife_japanese_animals; source_tattoolife_mors_traditional; the first is carried in source_id. No new fact: this edge restates a value already present in the corpus. STRENGTH 0.5 set by the T11.11c rule: this pairing is asserted by ONE parent row's association column and by no second row; the pack's scale reads 0.5 as 'context-dependent'. Inputs are corpus counts only - no source count, tier or confidence is used.
Associated with · 1
- strength 0.50promoted · not an independent attestationresearched
Promoted from motifs_seed.common_themes of motif_tiger ('nature'). Provenance inherited from the parent row(s): source_inkppl_japanese_style; source_tattoolife_japanese_animals; source_tattoolife_mors_traditional; the first is carried in source_id. No new fact: this edge restates a value already present in the corpus. STRENGTH 0.5 set by the T11.11c rule: this pairing is asserted by ONE parent row's association column and by no second row; the pack's scale reads 0.5 as 'context-dependent'. Inputs are corpus counts only - no source count, tier or confidence is used.
Can symbolize · 1
- strength 0.75needs cultural review
JAPANESE CONTEXT ONLY. Stated twice on the cited page: "tigers as symbols of fearlessness" in prose and "Tiger - symbolizes fearlessness" in its element list. No fetched source gives a Western tiger meaning, so none is asserted.