Swallow
A sailor’s tattoo for distance at sea. In the US Navy’s tradition each swallow stood for 5,000 nautical miles under way, and a bird that flies far and comes home stood for a safe return.
Meaning
The Naval History and Heritage Command, the US Navy’s historians, record that each swallow “originally symbolized 5,000 nautical miles underway”, and that sailors still wear swallows in various poses, often with a Navy motif or the name of a sweetheart or spouse. The Navy’s National Museum of the American Sailor told visitors to its exhibition “Marked by the Sea” that sailors once put one swallow or bluebird on the chest for every 5,000 miles. Serving sailors keep the custom: aboard the carrier USS Gerald R. Ford in 2017, Chief Electrician’s Mate Jay Akins said the sparrow on his wrist marked his first 5,000 nautical miles on deployment, and that he planned to add more for the miles since.
Origin and history
The swallow is one of the milestone tattoos, the designs a sailor had to earn. The review in Commonplace of the Independence Seaport Museum’s exhibition “Skin and Bones: Tattoos in the Life of the American Sailor” lists crossing the equator and traveling 5,000 miles among the milestones sailors marked, and notes that some tattoos were badges of honour: a sailor who got one before he had earned it could be reprimanded by his shipmates.
The Friends of HMS Trincomalee describe the usual arrangement: two swallows facing each other on the chest, the first for 5,000 miles and the second for 10,000. A Navy photograph of 1944 shows the count in use. Shipfitter Second Class Steven J. Kusial, working on a Seabee road crew on Guam, has two swallows on his right upper arm, which the Navy’s caption reads as at least 10,000 nautical miles under way.
Why a swallow
The sources give two reasons for the bird. The Friends of HMS Trincomalee point to its migration: swallows fly long distances and return to the same places every year, so the tattoo carried the hope of a safe return home. The Navy’s exhibition “Marked by the Sea” gave a sailor’s reason instead: swallows are only seen near land, and so they signify a safe return.
Swallow, bluebird or sparrow
The bird goes by more than one name. The Navy’s historians and the Trincomalee article say swallow; the Navy’s exhibition said one swallow or bluebird for every 5,000 miles; Chief Akins called his a sparrow. The meaning is the same in all three.
The sweetheart swallow
In the Second World War the swallow also carried a sweetheart’s name. Danielle Boiardi, curator of the Lyle Tuttle Tattoo Art Collection, told the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum that servicemen paired it with a heart and a ribbon bearing the woman’s name, “Marie”, say, because the swallow is a bird that can go long distances and return home. She called it a companionship symbol, to keep a sweetheart close while away at war. The other milestone tattoos are the Shellback turtle for crossing the equator and the Full-rigged ship for rounding Cape Horn.
Read next
- Next in Traditional tattoo motifsAnchorOne of the oldest sailors’ tattoos. The Navy’s historians record that it first marked a man who had crossed the Atlantic; today it is often a young US Navy sailor’s first tattoo.
- The same shape in Chinese mythology and symbolsWhite Tiger (Baihu)The White Tiger (白虎, Báihǔ) is the tiger of the west, one of the Four Symbols, the animals of the four quarters of the sky in Chinese cosmology. It stands for the west and for autumn, and it is paired with the Azure Dragon of the east: the dragon on the left, the tiger on the right.
See also
Full-rigged ship, Nautical star, Shellback turtle, Dragon, Hold fast, Pig and rooster.
Sources
- Sailors’ Tattoos: A Basic Primer, Heritage: customs and traditions, published 4 December 2024 (Internet Archive copy, 29 January 2026), Naval History and Heritage Command (U.S. Navy), Some Traditional Sailors’ Tattoos: Swallow; photo 80-G-K-2715
- Of Swallows, Shellbacks, & Sweethearts, by Lt. Col. Patrick Chaisson, MOAA magazine, October 2023: on “Marked by the Sea: Tattoos in the U.S. Navy” at the National Museum of the American Sailor, Great Lakes, Illinois, Military Officers Association of America, ‘Flash Art’
- Naval Ink, by Petty Officer 3rd Class Sean Elliott, USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) public affairs, 9 August 2017, Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (U.S. Navy), story text
- Body Art During World War II: From the Lyle Tuttle Tattoo Art Collection, Smithsonian Voices, National Air and Space Museum, 5 October 2020: interview with Danielle Boiardi, curator of the Lyle Tuttle Tattoo Art Collection (Internet Archive copy, 29 September 2026), Smithsonian Magazine, Can you talk about some of the different types of tattoos and their meaning?
- Sailors’ Tattoos and their Meanings, Quarterdeck, 2010 issue 2 (Summer), pp. 10–11 (offprint QD6), Friends of HMS Trincomalee (National Museum of the Royal Navy, Hartlepool), p. 2
- The Ink of History, Review of “Skin and Bones: Tattoos in the Life of the American Sailor” (Independence Seaport Museum, Philadelphia, 2009; curator Craig Bruns), seen at Mystic Seaport, Commonplace: The Journal of Early American Life, review text
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research
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