The 'P' Word [Updated]

 Following on a discussion of some portable antiquities on the market, David Gill recommends:

David Gill @davidwjgill 4 g.
W odpowiedzi do @mokersel @Victoria_S_Reed i 3 innych użytkowników
We have often seen the term "good provenance" used to mean that the object moved through a "distinguished" private collection - even if it had been looted. Provenance is obsolete: jettison it.

The term is so deeply entrenched in the art-history world that it may be difficult for the "art market" to abandon it. The term is ambiguous, and therefore creates a stumbling block in clear expression. In terms of dugup antiquities, 'provenance' of objects is where they come from in the archaeological record, i.e., bone pin fragment from the lower fill of Feature 14 at Site 52 in Otley, Suffolk. The provenance of a fake would be something like "garage in Empire Road, Dibley, Oxforshire".

So if all we know about where something came from is "formerly in collection of Col. Algernon Farquart MBE, acquired from Grebkesh and Runn Auctions Nov 14th 1969, Lot 055 (property of a Middlesex Gentleman)", that's not full provenance, it is only a fragment of the Collection History. It is missing the all important how-it-got-on-the-market-and-left-unknown-source-country bit, which is a vital part of the legitimising part of any object's biography. Of course the route by which a fake object sold off the workbench of a manufacturer's garage in Dibley came to the present vendor gives information of another sort.

Update 17.10.2022

The discussion continued and it was suggested that a cumbersome double terminology be accepted:

Patty Gerstenblith @PGerstenblith · 16 paź
Complete provenance for an archaeological object is its history of ownership (time and place) back to its find spot (its provenience). The quality of the provenance information (whether it is objectively verifiable) is important in assessing the reliability of a stated provenance

I think that neatly encapsulates the confusion here, the final word of that tweet, we may assume, was probably meant to be "provenience". As I said, ambiguous. "Provenience" is primarily US usage. Having two confusingly similar terms that mean different but overlapping things in different parts of an international debate invites attempts to clarify conceptual issues by restricting use of both as Gill proposes ((NB, in Gill's usage "Collection", NOT "Collecting History"). Nevertheless those based in the art and museum world seem to stick to their guns:  Victoria Reed (@Victoria_S_Reed) is still anxious not to jettison traditional usage and suggests

People misuse words all the time, but that doesn't mean that the word itself isn't useful. Provenance is clearly defined in art reference works -- and is much more commonly used than "provenience".

 and: Julie K. Harris @Eronay001 22 g.

[..] Provenance seems to be a broad terminology establishing history of object since creation and/or found whereas provenience is the precise intact archaeological context of said object(s). That was my understanding of it.

The problem is that not everybody, and every discipline, sees the term in the same way. Provenience is a mainly US usage anyway. A Google search for "provenance+archaeology" gets 2,38 million hits, "provenience+archaeology" gets 228k and "provenience+archeology" 320k. 

So far, nobody has really said what's wrong with separating it from Collection History in object biography. Lumping everything under the P-word allows obfuscation of the archaeological origins of an "antiquity"/ "ancient artwork" and the mechanism how an object got into the trade ("legally and ethically" - i.e., not trashing archaeological sites without record).

We might also reflect on how the term "provenance" would be treated in other spheres of collecting: entomology, palaeontology, fine wines, Chippendale commodes, postage stamps, rare coins, pedigree dogs and horses, and celebrity memorabilia. It seems clear that there cannot be a one-fits-all-sizes definition of "provenance" (deriving from the one used for old paintings on the wall of a drawing room in a house off Berkley Square) that covers all of these areas where "where tis comes from" is important. So why should we continue to accept that dugup antiquities (as so-called "ancient art") are "basically the same as a painting"?