Creature provenance
The Registry record that follows a creature through rescue, placement, transfer, seizure, surrender, and disputed custody.
Provenance is the Registry’s attempt to make a creature’s history harder to erase than a bill of sale. A file may be incomplete, disputed, or forged; it is not supposed to become blank merely because custody changes.
Keeper Handbook procedure →Public extract
A public creature file carries recorded origin, changes of lawful custody, and major Registry milestones. Protected rehabilitation notes, active investigative material, and certain witness records are withheld from the public ledger.
Disputed history
Belowmarket transfers, forged seals, missing handlers, or conflicting prior claims can leave a file disputed for years. Clearing one false entry does not necessarily answer where the creature was before it appeared.
Why old paper matters
A continuous file can reconnect a rescued creature to an earlier sanctuary, expose repeated relabeling by a trader, or prove that two apparently unrelated seizures passed through the same handler. Registry clerks treat ordinary clerical continuity as one of the basin’s least dramatic anti-trafficking tools.