Humans have been deliberately altering their anatomies for thousands of years.
Why? Reasons vary greatly. For some cultures, it traces back to religious and spiritual beliefs, while for others, it's simply a case of appearing more (or in some cases purposefully less) attractive to the opposite sex.
Women of the Apatani tribe in Arunachal Pradesh, India, for example, traditionally wore these nose plugs to diminish their beauty, making them less vulnerable to abduction by men from other tribes, though these days it's a dying tradition.
Teeth sharpening is an ancient practice that traces its roots way back to early man. In some cultures teeth were filed down since they were believed to harness negative energy, while in others they were sharpened to indicate social standing, age, or to imitate ferocious animals.
In the Ethiopian tribe of Mursi, the women wear large circular discs in their lips, achieved by piercing the bottom lip and fitting it with plates of increasing size. It might look dramatic and painful, but in Mursi tradition the larger the plate is, the more alluring the woman is considered to be.
AzVision.az presents the photos of the most extreme forms of body modification in the history of man citing the Daily Mail.
A woman from the African tribe of Mursi in Omo Valley, Ethiopia, displays her lip plate - an expression of female maturity and a signal that she is ready to bear children - achieved by stretching the piercing with discs of increasing size
Women from the Kayan Lahwi tribe in Myanmar start adding brass coils to their necks from the age of five, the weight of which pushes the collar bone down and compresses the rib cage to give the illusion of longer necks
Women of the Apatani tribe in Arunachal Pradesh, India, traditionally wore these nose plugs to make themselves look less attractive, and thus less likely to be attacked or kidnapped by men from other tribes, though these days it's a dying tradition
Another woman from the Mursi tribe wearing a lip plate and a set of cow horns atop her head. The more decorative her appearance, the higher her standing is
This Mursi woman, pictured with her infant, is not wearing her lip plate but the gaping hole remains. Usually these discs are crafted from clay or wood and inserted to attract a husband
An African woman with stretched earlobes and a chunky lip piercing, left, and right, a self-proclaimed 'god woman' with a spear piercing her tongue participating in the Pooram Festival in Kerala, India
Left, Dennis Avner, also known as the Stalking Cat, was a Nevada man famed for his extreme body modifications who died in 2012 at the age of 54. Pictured right is Argentinian Victor Peralta, who has 90 per cent of his body tattooed, displaying his split tongue
A worshipper at the 2012 Vegetarian Festival in Phuket, Thailand, where men and women prove their religious devotion by taking part in ritualistic self-mutilation and pain trials
This 95-year-old belongs to the last generation of Chinese women who had their feet bound to inhibit growth from a young age
In Indonesia's Dani Village, New Guinea, some women like this one cut off the tips of their fingers when a relative dies
Left, a man from the Abyei region of Sudan with scars inflicted on his forehead - a traditional rite of passage whereby wounds are created and stopped from healing - and right, a young woman in in South Omo, Ethiopia, with similar scars on her arm
The tattooed face of a former Longwa Village headhunter in India'a Nagaland. Until as recently as the 1960s, these headhunters took great pride in killing their enemies from other tribes then severing and displaying their heads
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