Provenance (geology) to determine the origin of sediments. This is often used in conjunction with the study of exhumation histories, interpretation of drainage networks and their evolution, and forward-modelling of paleo-earth systems. In combination, these help to characterise the "source to sink" journey of clastic sediments from hinterland to sedimentary basin. Provenance (from the French provenir, "to come from"), is the place of origin or earliest known history of something. In geology (specifically, in sedimentary petrology), the term provenance deals with the question where sediments originate from. The purpose of sedimentary provenance studies is to reconstruct and to interpret the history of
Prior to the Fire knew. The band do not ascribe any particular meaning to it; Heppner commented that the artwork, combined with the title, could be "a pre-creation thing" or even "a Billy Joel reference." In any case, the meaning of the artwork and title has been left open to interpretation, and the artwork was chosen specifically because it did not conform to an existing standard. Much as the label had argued with the band over the quality of the songs before production, RCA continued to debate the issue with Priestess after the album sessions were finished in the fall of 2008. Despite the