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History vocabulary · Sources and Archives

Provenance

Meaning in history, with examples

/ˈprɒvənəns/nounAdvanced term

In history, provenance means: The origin of a document or object and the record of who has owned or kept it since it was made, used to judge whether it is genuine and lawfully held.

In Turkish: menşe, köken, provenans

How it is used

Archivists, curators and art historians research and document provenance. Objects without a clear provenance may have been looted or forged, so museums now check it closely. In archives, the principle of provenance keeps records grouped by the office that created them.

Example sentences

  1. The museum returned the statue after provenance research showed it had been illegally excavated.

  2. Always note the provenance of each document you photograph in the archive.

Common collocations

  • provenance research
  • a documented provenance
  • unknown provenance
  • the principle of provenance
  • archiveA collection of historical records kept for long-term use, or the building or institution where such records are stored and made available to researchers.
  • artifactAn object made or shaped by people, such as a tool, coin, weapon or piece of jewellery, especially one studied for what it reveals about the past.
  • source criticismThe careful evaluation of a historical source to judge where it came from, who made it and why, and how reliable and useful it is for a particular question.
  • archivistA professional who collects, organises, preserves and describes the records in an archive and helps researchers find and use them.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Sources and Archives

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