💡Basics

Ordinals

Ordinals refers to a theory that focuses on assigning individual identities and numismatic value to satoshis, the smallest unit of the Bitcoin. This theory enables satoshis to be tracked, transferred, and given meaning through inscriptions, which are unique digital artifacts that can be held in Bitcoin wallets and traded as curios. Ordinal theory does not require any changes to the Bitcoin network and can be used without the need for sidechains or tokens.

Digital Artifacts

A digital artifact is a unique and complete digital item that is fully owned by an individual or entity, and cannot be altered or censored by any third party. It must be decentralized, immutable, on-chain, and unrestricted, similar to the characteristics of a physical artifact. A digital artifact should not rely on external references or off-chain content, and should be able to be traded or disposed of freely without any royalties or restrictions. In summary, a digital artifact is a digital item that holds the same properties as a physical artifact, and is held to a higher standard among NFTs.

Inscriptions

An inscription is a unique digital artifact created by assigning arbitrary content to individual satoshis using ordinal theory. This content can be any byte string and is stored on-chain in taproot script-path spend scripts, making it secure, immutable, and decentralized. In order to create an inscription, a two-phase commit/reveal procedure is used, which involves creating a taproot output that commits to a script containing the inscription content, and then spending that output to reveal the content on-chain. Once created, inscriptions can be transferred, bought, sold, lost to fees, and recovered using bitcoin transactions and addresses, and can be used to create NFTs or other bitcoin-native digital assets.