MIME defines a number of new RFC 822 header fields that are used to
   describe the content of a MIME entity.  These header fields occur in
   at least two contexts:

    (1)   As part of a regular RFC 822 message header.

    (2)   In a MIME body part header within a multipart
          construct.

   The formal definition of these header fields is as follows:

     entity-headers := [ content CRLF ]
                       [ encoding CRLF ]
                       [ id CRLF ]
                       [ description CRLF ]
                       *( MIME-extension-field CRLF )

     MIME-message-headers := entity-headers
                             fields
                             version CRLF
                             ; The ordering of the header
                             ; fields implied by this BNF
                             ; definition should be ignored.

     MIME-part-headers := entity-headers
                          [ fields ]
                          ; Any field not beginning with
                          ; "content-" can have no defined
                          ; meaning and may be ignored.
                          ; The ordering of the header
                          ; fields implied by this BNF
                          ; definition should be ignored.

   The syntax of the various specific MIME header fields will be
   described in the following sections.

4.  MIME-Version Header Field

   Since RFC 822 was published in 1982, there has really been only one
   format standard for Internet messages, and there has been little
   perceived need to declare the format standard in use.  This document
   is an independent specification that complements RFC 822.  Although
   the extensions in this document have been defined in such a way as to
   be compatible with RFC 822, there are still circumstances in which it
   might be desirable for a mail-processing agent to know whether a
   message was composed with the new standard in mind.




 
RFC 2045                Internet Message Bodies            November 1996


   Therefore, this document defines a new header field, "MIME-Version",
   which is to be used to declare the version of the Internet message
   body format standard in use.

   Messages composed in accordance with this document MUST include such
   a header field, with the following verbatim text:

     MIME-Version: 1.0

   The presence of this header field is an assertion that the message
   has been composed in compliance with this document.

   Since it is possible that a future document might extend the message
   format standard again, a formal BNF is given for the content of the
   MIME-Version field:

     version := "MIME-Version" ":" 1*DIGIT "." 1*DIGIT

   Thus, future format specifiers, which might replace or extend "1.0",
   are constrained to be two integer fields, separated by a period.  If
   a message is received with a MIME-version value other than "1.0", it
   cannot be assumed to conform with this document.

   Note that the MIME-Version header field is required at the top level
   of a message.  It is not required for each body part of a multipart
   entity.  It is required for the embedded headers of a body of type
   "message/rfc822" or "message/partial" if and only if the embedded
   message is itself claimed to be MIME-conformant.

   It is not possible to fully specify how a mail reader that conforms
   with MIME as defined in this document should treat a message that
   might arrive in the future with some value of MIME-Version other than
   "1.0".

   It is also worth noting that version control for specific media types
   is not accomplished using the MIME-Version mechanism.  In particular,
   some formats (such as application/postscript) have version numbering
   conventions that are internal to the media format.  Where such
   conventions exist, MIME does nothing to supersede them.  Where no
   such conventions exist, a MIME media type might use a "version"
   parameter in the content-type field if necessary.