<p>The <var>Pattern</var> is always a <a href="#regex">regular
expression</a> matched against the URL-Path of the incoming request
(the part after the hostname but before any question mark indicating
-the beginning of a query string).</p>
+the beginning of a query string) or, in per-directory context, against
+the request's path relative to the directory for which the rule is
+defined.</p>
<p class="figure">
<img src="../images/syntax_rewriterule.png" alt="Syntax of the RewriteRule directive" /><br />