Dolly Parton's secret tattoos debunked: Why she always wore long sleeves
Picture a heavily tattooed person, and it's unlikely that Dolly Parton is the person who comes to mind.
And yet, the late country legend has been at the centre of countless rumours suggesting that she was secretly covered in ink.
So did Ms Parton actually have an extensive collection of tattoos? Here's what we know.
Did Dolly Parton have tattoos?
Although Parton was rarely, if ever, spotted out and about in short sleeves, eagle-eyed fans have been able to deduce that she did have some ink on her arms.
In 2006, an image of Parton wearing a sheer white shirt at a DVD launch party for the 25th anniversary of 9 to 5.
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And if you look at the photo really closely, you can make out what appears to be the outline of a butterfly tattoo on one of her upper arms.
Take a look below:
Parton had previously confirmed that she did, in fact, have some ink, sharing a peek at the angel and butterfly design with Jay Leno during a 1996 appearance on his show.
After noticing the ink on Parton's shoulder, Leno enquired further, to which Parton replied by pulling her sleeve down ever so slightly, telling him: "Yeah, I have a little tattoo. Don’t start pulling my clothes down."
In 2011, Parton's friend Roseanne Barr shared further details about the singer's ink, revealing that her tattoos were in pastel colours.
"Do you know who’s totally tattooed? I shouldn’t even tell this. Dolly Parton is totally tattooed," she told Craig Ferguson.
"She showed me. She’s got all these awesome tattoos all over her body. No black or blue lines. All pastel, gorgeous bows all over everything."
Absolutely Fabulous star Jennifer Saunders is another famous face who's caught a glimpse of the ink, with the actor previously telling the panel show There’s Something About Movies, that she was once granted a sneak peak at a rose design on Parton's chest.
"She just unbuttoned her little jerkin and there’s full t*ts, rose up, I have to say, and she has the most beautiful tattoos, like works of art," the 68-year-old recalled.
Parton explained the motivation behind deciding to get inked in 2014, revealing that most of her designs were to cover up scars.
"I do have a few little tattoos, but they were mostly done to cover scars because I’m so fair," she explained on the “Today” show in 2014.
"So it started with that, and I’m not really one to have tattoos, but I do have a few, and they’re not where you can see them."
She went on to add that the tattoos were 'mostly' for her husband Carl Dean, who passed away last year.
Parton later confirmed the existence of her tattoos once again during a 2017 interview with Vanity Fair, saying that she wasn't intending to make a 'big statement' with her ink.
"I was covering up some scars that I had, ‘cause I have a tendency to have keloid scar tissue, and I have a tendency where if I have any kind of scars anywhere then they kind of have a purple tinge that I can never get rid of," she explained. "So mine are all pastels, what few that I have, and they’re meant to cover some scars. I’m not trying to make some big, bold statement."
In 2020, she told PEOPLE that her ink also included ribbons, bows and butterflies.
As for her decision to choose butterflies, Parton was known for having a long-held appreciation for the creature, from penning tracks such as 'Love Is Like a Butterfly' to featuring them as a motif in her clothing and stage set-ups.
"Butterflies don’t sting, they don’t bite, and they are so beautiful," she told W magazine in 2021. "And I just kind of related to them with my own personality. I claimed them as my little symbol."
Parton's lifelong love for butterflies has since become entwined with memorials after it was announced that she'd passed away after a brief cancer battle, with fans leaving various butterfly tributes while Google updated the 'Dolly Parton' results page to feature several fluttering animations of butterflies.
Topics: Dolly Parton, Celebrity
Brenna Cooper