The acupuncture-correspondence argument has been made primarily by researchers at Eurac Research in Bolzano and the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Their observation was not simply that some tattoos fell near acupuncture-related body areas but that the specific sites matched points used in traditional East Asian medicine to treat lower back pain, knee pain, and ankle disorders — precisely the areas where Ötzi showed degenerative joint changes on CT examination.
The left wrist tattoo location, for example, corresponds in traditional acupuncture to a point used to treat headaches and nausea — conditions consistent with Ötzi’s documented Beau’s lines indicating recent illness. The foot and ankle tattoos align with points traditionally used to treat digestive complaints and lower limb pain.
This correspondence does not prove that Ötzi received therapeutic tattooing from someone with knowledge equivalent to classical Chinese acupuncture — the two traditions developed independently in different parts of the world at different times, and the specific theoretical framework of Chinese acupuncture was not developed until millennia after Ötzi’s death. What it may suggest is a broader cross-cultural discovery that certain body locations produce therapeutic effects when stimulated, a discovery that multiple ancient traditions arrived at independently.
An alternative interpretation is that the placement was coincidental — that body areas prone to chronic pain or illness are simply more likely to receive physical interventions, including tattooing, in any culture, and the apparent correspondence is a reflection of that general tendency rather than a specific therapeutic system.
The 2015 multispectral imaging study that identified the last remaining tattoos to be found on the body was important both for completing the inventory and for the technique itself. Many of Ötzi’s tattoos are visible under normal light, but the skin preservation means that some are indistinct or overlap with natural discoloration. Multispectral imaging — using cameras sensitive to infrared and ultraviolet wavelengths beyond what the human eye perceives — can distinguish between the carbon-particle tattoo pigment and the surrounding skin in ways that visible-light examination cannot. The 2015 survey found additional marks that had not been recorded in earlier studies.