Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Place of origin; derivation.
- n. The history of the ownership of an object, especially when documented or authenticated. Used of artworks, antiques, and books.
- n. The records or documents authenticating such an object or the history of its ownership.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Origin; source or quarter from which anything comes; provenience: especially in the sense of ‘place of manufacture, production, or discovery.’
Wiktionary
- n. Place or source of origin.
- n. archaeology The place and time of origin of some artifact or other object. See Usage note below.
- n. art The history of ownership of a work of art
- n. computing The copy history of a piece of data, or the intermediate pieces of data utilized to compute a final data element, as in a database record or web site (data provenance)
- n. computing The execution history of computer processes which were utilized to compute a final piece of data (process provenance)
- n. of a person Background; history; place of origin; ancestry.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Origin; source; provenience.
WordNet 3.0
- n. where something originated or was nurtured in its early existence
Etymologies
- From French provenance ("origin"), from Middle French provenant, present participle of provenir ("come forth, arise"), from Latin provenio ("to come forth"). (Wiktionary)
- French, from provenant, present participle of provenir, to originate, from Old French, from Latin prōvenīre : prō-, forth; see pro-1 + venīre, to come; see gwā- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The simplest way to verify provenance is by looking for items that come with a Certificate of Authenticity or a Letter of Authenticity (often abbreviated to COA and LOA).”
“Now his cellar is deep enough to have plenty of old vintage of white Burgundy and white Bordeaux to draw upon to hedge his exposure to premox, and I am sure that despite his Herculean efforts to ascertain provenance on the old wines he has purchased over the last decade, it is highly unlikely that he has not had to deal with more than his fair share of expensive fakes in his cellar.”
Natural wines, premox, chenin blanc, 07 Port and Rhone – John Gilman | Dr Vino's wine blog
“Leading the fleet of more than 20 antique boats from premier German manufacturers is an exquisite circa-1909 hand-painted Marklin "Priscilla" steamboat, 19 inches long, with provenance from the collection of the late Bill Bertoia.”
The Huffington Post: Reyne Haines: Reyne Gauge: Toys for the Holidays for Grownups!
“Though over 12,000 1873-CC dimes with no arrows were minted, most were apparently destroyed after passage of the Act. Some scholars speculate that the lone survivor was retrieved from a 1874 Assay Commission meeting by Mint Superintendent Archibald Loudon Snowden; the coin provenance has been traced from Snowden to famed collector Louis Eliasberg, Sr. (sold from that collection in the late 1990s).”
“The Brady provenance is being seriously challenged, especially in this article by Kate Marcus.”
“The Turks and the British shared an anal-retentive streak in Empire management and the historical provenance is unanswerable.”
“– All will come with a letter of provenance from the publisher”
“Some scholars speculate that the lone survivor was retrieved from a 1874 Assay Commission meeting by Mint Superintendent Archibald Loudon Snowden; the coin provenance has been traced from Snowden to famed collector Louis Eliasberg, Sr. sold from that collection in the late 1990s.”
“This version, however, has nothing to do with breading, deep frying or that ubiquitous nuclear-yellow gloppy sauce whose provenance is unknown, and everything to do with sunshine and bold but light flavors.”
“She decided not to take the Maserati, the Lamborghini, the Maybach, or the Ferrari, these having too many buttons of uncertain provenance on the dash, and settled instead on the Mercedes in which Khalil usually chauffeured her, and with whose controls she was quite familiar, including the special button on the walnut dash that overrode the guards 'control of the front gate.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘provenance’.
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
-
Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
-
museum words
words from work
provenance, accession, deaccession, conservation, preparator, registrar, curator, jargon, Oz clip, bell plate, stretcher, ornate and 115 more...
-
phrontistery - p
from phrontistery.info
pustule, purulence, pushful, purser, purpureal, putative, purpure, purpresture, purloin, purline, purlieu, purlicue and 1766 more...
-
2nd part
prelude, ample, escalate, prototype, accession, acquisition, archives, zealot, indict, verdict, intimidating, timid and 454 more...
-
(1st_wk_150)-Dec_5_2012
voracious, indiscriminate, eminent, steeped, replete, abound, technology, prognosticate, automaton, matron, paradox, realm and 297 more...
-
EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...health, follow, condition, meeting, minister, beginning, chapter, information, language, remain, covered, respect and 2614 more...
-
EU Buzz - single words (1+2+3)
1. Strictly EU terms with special European meaning used only in the EU
+
2. Keywords central to the understanding of the EU (people working for the EU are usually able to give thematic...acceleration, action, additionality, administrator, agenda, agricultural, agri-environmental, agriflation, agri-food, applicant, approach, assent and 1325 more...
-
gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1824 more...
-
A Refined Lexicon
ambivalence, ambivalent, equivocal, equivocation, equivocate, prevaricate, prevarication, quietude, quiescent, quiescence, vanquish, pluviosity and 137 more...
-
word list!!!!
lagniappe
syzygy, bloviate, lagniappe, laconic, condign, umbrage, susurrus, thaumaturgy, capacious, capitulate, glower, repast and 179 more...
-
newGRE
mostly from magoosh
imbue, verge on, nonchalant, deliberate, timorous, futile, provisional, dissect, checked, tinged, alluring, visionary and 1046 more...
-
My Revised GRE Preparation List
Words from the new GRE : This list consists mostly of words from the book Magoosh-GRE-vocab-ebook, which is one of the best vocab materials available, especially if you have started preparing one ...
alacrity, prosaic, veracity, paucity, contrite, trite, maintain, laconic, pugnacious, disparate, egregious, innocuous and 533 more...
-
GRE vocab
martinet, churlish, polyglot, aplomb, dissembler, histrionics, prevarication, ignominy, impugn, fastidious, trenchant, perfunctory and 155 more...
-
GRE
trope, surreptitious, tenet, insular, munificent, exegesis, limpid, acerbic, litany, cupidity, restive, protract and 76 more...
-
Listless
Nowhere else to put these yet.
sibilant, cloying, pithy, apologia, odyssey, amanuensis, pleasantries, ginormous, burnish, sojourn, quonset, over-under and 217 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for provenance.
reesetee In rare/antique books, evidence of the history of the book's ownership. Evidence might include auction records, booksellers' receipts, book plates, and so on. Provenance may establish the importance of a certain copy because of its ownership (for example, if a president, statesman, famous author, or other prominent person owned it); it's also essential in establishing ownership/history of especially rare items. Feb 22, 2007