Weird but True: Ear Anatomy and Piercing Names

Did you ever wonder how some of the more interesting ear piercings got such funky names? Well, believe it or not, some of them were actually named after the part of the ear’s anatomy that they correspond to. Seriously. Just take a look:

You probably saw some familiar words, right? A lot of unique piercings of the face and body were named after the first person to be noticed wearing them, or named by the first piercer to successfully complete them. For some piercings though, there’s disagreement over who wore it, pierced it, or noticed it first. In these cases and many others, an emerging piercing may be named simply after the corresponding anatomy.

The ear is one complicated area of the human body that boasts many such piercings, including the helix, tragus, anti-tragus, and conch. Although some of these weren’t popularized until long after they were created, many of today’s common ear cartilage piercings were first performed by Jim Ward and his fellow artists at the Gauntlet, which was the very first piercing parlor in the united States. And even though you might never have seen one until after the year 2000, many ear piercings have been around since the 1980s!

It might sound weird, but it’s definitely true.