The meander motif took its name from the river Meander, a river with many twists, mentioned by Homer in Iliad. The motif is also known as Greek key or Greek fret.

Meander was the most important symbol in Ancient Greece, symbolizing infinity or the eternal flow of things. Many temples and objects were decorated with this motif, and it is considered that there is a connection with the Cretan labyrinth indeed - a labyrinth can be drawn using a Greek key.

Meander symbolizes as well the bonds of friendship, of love and devotion and thats the reason its often given as marriage gift. It can symbolize as well the four cardinal points, the 4 seasons, waves especially in the round version of it, or snakes, among others.

The World's Oldest Tattoo?

Cherchen Woman's Friends' Tattoo

The top line was my free hand attempt. The second, a deserifed version, the third, the tatoo taken with photoshop from the lady's hand (RIP).

This tattoo was found on the hand of a partly caucasian woman, found mummified in the Gobi dessert, who lived about 3000 years ago. Bearing in mind that she or her friends were wearing plaid (tartan, yes really) wool, there are even those that suggest that the pattern and the people are of celtic origin.

It looks a little bit like a design linking forward and backward epsilons.Or maybe it is topologically similar to a "greek key" pattern, especially if sanserif and squared, as in the lower row.Or it may even bear a similarity to a Samoan Ta Tau tattoo, from which the word "tattoo" is derived.

I guess that the similarities are more likely to random or due to the sort of patterns that humans like.

Original tatoo, center bottom here.

Sorry, the above tattoo is about 3000-3500 years old but the worlds oldest belongs to Otzi apparently, at 5300 years old. His seem to be less ornate though.

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The Greek Key topology is a kind of structure of a protein. The strands of the protein is like a single line, but connected together like a Greek Key. There are some examples on the left.