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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 July 2016
A primary motivation for studying globular clusters is that, as the oldest known galactic fossils, they trace the earliest stages of galactic evolution; indeed, they may hold the key to understanding galaxy formation. Thus it is clearly of great importance to learn how to read the fossil record. To do this, we need to understand something about how the globular clusters themselves formed. Were they the first bound objects to form, or did they form in larger pre-existing systems of which they are just small surviving fragments? If the latter, what were the prehistoric cluster-forming systems like? And how did they manage to produce objects like globular clusters?