From the Greek adjective παλαιός (palaiós), meaning "old, aged," the participle ὤν / ὄντος (ōn / óntos), meaning "being," and the noun λόγος (lógos), meaning "statement or reckoning," paleontology is quite simply the reckoning with or study of ancient life. In a technical sense, it is the study of life prior to the start of the Holocene epoch, so roughly 11,700 years before present, when we begin to see fossils in the geological record. As a reminder, a paleontologist studies fossils, while an archaeologist studies human artifacts and remains.