http://www.sgi.com/tech/openGL/paper.design/subsection3_4_3.html (Silicon Surf Promotional CD, 01/1995)
In order to minimize the requirements on how an application using the API must store and present its data, the API must provide a means to specify individual components of geometric objects and operations on them. This fine-grained control is required so that these components and operations may be specified in any order and so that control of rendering operations is flexible enough to accommodate the requirements of diverse applications.