This second volume of the Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopaedia is an essential companion to
the critically acclaimed first volume. It features previously unpublished drawings and
photographs from the extraordinary archives of Danzig Baldaev and Sergei Vasiliev. During his
lifetime as a guard in St Petersburg's notorious Kresty Prison Baldaev diligently recorded
over 3 000 criminals' tattoos and their coded meanings. His drawings form a unique gallery a
passport into a hidden world of shovel-faced politicians fornicating devils messages tangled
in barbed wire. Tattoos on hands feet legs torsos foreheads eyelids buttocks and genitals
all take their place in this fascinating document of a rapidly disappearing criminal society
where history status and even sexual preference are indelibly etched on the body.
Introduction by Anne Applebaum winner of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize.
