Writing an ownership history a buyer can check

1. Write it oldest first: the finder or the earliest collection, with a place and the years held; then each later owner, sale or auction with the lot number; then you.

2. Beside every step name the evidence — the auction catalogue page, the old collection label, the dated photograph, the invoice, the export licence, the customs entry. A step that rests on family memory says so.

3. State gaps as gaps: how long and between whom. An honest gap is worth more than an invented link, because a buyer's own checks will find the invention.

4. Pin the two legal dates. When was the object first documented outside its country of origin (the CPIA lists, the Pre-Columbian statute and every patrimony law turn on it), and for US finds, when was it found and was that before 31 October 1979? Fill both fields from the earliest document, not the label.

5. Put owners in Prior owners in order, the earliest collection in Prior collection, the earliest out-of-country date in Outside country of origin by, and attach the documents. The certificate prints the chain, the listing carries it, and eBay's antiquities policy — which requires an ownership history in the listing — is satisfied by the same text.

Sources

Cite this article

Stratum Strata. "Writing an ownership history a buyer can check" (How-to). Stratum Strata pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-20. https://stratum.black/strata/how-to/how-to-write-an-ownership-history. Accessed 2026-09-21.

BibTeX · CSL-JSON

@misc{stratum-how-to-write-an-ownership-history,
  title        = {Writing an ownership history a buyer can check},
  author       = {{Stratum Strata}},
  howpublished = {\url{https://stratum.black/strata/how-to/how-to-write-an-ownership-history}},
  year         = {2026},
  note         = {How-to article, Stratum Strata pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-20; sources: stratum. Accessed 2026-09-21.}
}

Citations carry the pack version and the article's as-of date so they resolve to the same text later. The facts themselves belong to the sources listed below; cite those for the science.