Bitcoin Ordinals began gaining traction in early 2023, with the very first inscriptions placed onto Bitcoin towards the end of 2022. Though it started off with a few hundred inscriptions, today it has grown to millions within a year’s time

An inscription on Bitcoin takes place when a satoshi (smallest unit of value) gets inscribed (or written) with data. With this comes the creation of digital artifacts native to the blockchain itself.

The ability to inscribe data directly onto Bitcoin is a technological breakthrough that has turned many eyes back to Bitcoin, some for the very first time. Ordinal Theory, or Ordinals, is simply a way to number satoshis, giving people the ability to track and transfer specific sats. 

Standardization in Ordinals

What does it mean to either develop or follow a standard? Standardization often refers to a particular set of rules that everyone can follow for the best possible outcome or results.  

During the development of email, POP and IMAP served as popular standards for proper mailbox operations. HTTP and HTTPS serve as internet standards for transferring data across web browsers. 

Standards in Ordinal Theory operate in a similar manner, where developers create a set of rules for those inscribing onto Bitcoin. These standards allow people to inscribe their data in the most efficient and effective ways possible.

Parent-Child Provenance enters the scene

Parent-Child Provenance, or simply Provenance, is a key standard within Ordinal Theory. Essentially, provenance is proving that child inscriptions were created by the owner of the parent inscription. Let’s discuss it with a hypothetical example:

Say Fred from San Francisco wants to inscribe a 3k collection of alligators onto Bitcoin. Fred can create the original parent inscription, then later create the 3k alligator child inscriptions to demonstrate that the children are all part of a single collection instead of 3k random alligators.

Provenance in Ordinal Theory also states that those children, aka the 3k alligators, can then create children of their own which leads to intricate hierarchies. At this point, we may have 6k little alligators running loose on the Bitcoin blockchain, yet they are all from the same family of inscriptions.

OCM Genesis – The First Collection to Utilize Provenance

OnChainMonkey is known for creating the first complete 10k collection on Bitcoin. In addition, this collection, known as Genesis, was the first Ordinals collection to utilize Parent-Child Provenance.

Danny Yang, creator of OnChainMonkey, speaks to the technological achievements of OCM Genesis:

“…We focused on creating a collection with long term value, and it took over two years to create this collection on Bitcoin. We worked with the Ordinals team on the collection standard and used Parent-Child Provenance for OCM Genesis…

OCM Genesis is a remarkable 10k collection on Bitcoin, the first and only 10k Parent-Child Provenance collection created in 2023.” Source

What does all this mean? 

At the end of the day, provenance in Ordinals is very important. Without it, people would never know which inscriptions belonged to a particular collection. All we would have is a series of random inscriptions on Bitcoin with little rhyme or reason for their existence.

Without standards on Ordinals, developers and creators have no roadmap for proper inscription practices. Provenance, along with other important standards such as recursion and reinscription, are teaming up to help shape the future of Ordinal Theory.

Where do we go from here? How many new and useful things can be built on top of Bitcoin? Stay up to date on everything Ordinals by following Danny Yang, creator of OnChainMonkey, 3 Bitcoin companies, and the Stanford Bitcoin Meetup (2013).

Also, feel free to check out the Ordinal Theory Handbook here.