Data Lineage and Provenance

Provenance records the origin and identity of data, documents, or evidence. Lineage describes the path taken after origin: transformations, joins, versions, filters, and intermediate systems up to the current result. Together, they make it possible to reconstruct where an answer came from and how it was produced.

A final citation does not replace this chain. Agents may combine retrieval, tools, and memory across several steps, so each artifact needs an identifier, version, timestamp, and causal relationship in the trace. Without that link, an audit may find possible sources but cannot establish which ones influenced a decision.