Tatoos and piercing, though they might appear as something like a trend, if not a craze, remain for a majority minority and even fringe practices. For the adolescent, questing for his identity (no more a child, not yet an adult), the tegmental sign is a way of engraving in the flesh dramatic events of his existence. The body mark is a search for independence, a symbolic attainment of self-reliance, a way of severing the umbilical cord and of asserting oneself. In face of a life no longer under control, the body is an object at hand, on which self-will is almost unbridled... These body modifications testify to change.