NB: Guidance for encoding information about the original and historical disposition of the text-bearing object is provided in the sections on Original location of the text-bearing object and Original date of text and/or object.
It is customary in producing an edition of a pre-modern manuscript, papyrus, inscription, or other text-bearing object to enumerate the occasions on which modern persons encountered and reported seminal information about the object, its condition and disposition, etc., together with associated bibliographic references where possible. The initial such observation is often the occasion of finding, sometimes in situ, sometimes in circumstances or reuse, sometimes already in the context of a modern collection. There follow other observations, culminating in the "last observed location" or "current location."
Following general TEI guidance, EpiDoc treats each such observation as a discrete event in space and time, and encodes each in a separate <provenance> element in the <history> section of the header. The type attribute is used with the following standard values to distinguish the major types of events:
A general example is provided in the main section on Provence of the text-bearing object. Specific guidance for each type of provenance event is provided in its own section as follows: