I would say sometime in the stone age. Tattooing is one of those inventions that have been made again and again by primitive people all over the world. Like baking bread
Hard to tell when women adopted the practice but men were tattoed well over 5,000 years ago. The world's oldest known tattoos belong to Ötzi, the European Tyrolean Iceman who died and was buried beneath an Alpine glacieralong the Austrian–Italian border around 3250 B.C. Ötzi had 61 tattoos across his body, including his left wrist, lower legs, lower back and torso.
Tattooing existed in bible times. It was a practice of pagan nations in connection with their religion. For this reason God forbade the nation of Israel to imitate the pagans. (levíticus 19:28)