Scholars categorize the genre of chronicle into two subgroups: live chronicles, and dead chronicles. A
dead chronicle is one where the author assembles a list of events up to the time of their writing, but does not record further events as they occur. A
live chronicle is where one or more authors add to a chronicle in a regular fashion, recording contemporary events shortly after they occur. Because of the immediacy of the information, historians tend to value live chronicles, such as
annals, over dead ones. The term often refers to a book written by a chronicler in the Middle Ages describing historical events in a country, or the lives of a nobleman or a clergyman, although it is also applied to a record of public events. The earliest medieval chronicle to combine both retrospective (
dead) and contemporary (
live) entries, is the
Chronicle of Ireland, which spans the years 431 to 911. Chronicles are the predecessors of modern "
time lines" rather than analytical histories. They represent accounts, in prose or verse, of local or distant events over a considerable period of time, both the lifetime of the individual chronicler and often those of several subsequent
continuators. If the chronicles deal with events year by year, they are often called
annals. Unlike the modern historian, most chroniclers tended to take their information as they found it, and made little attempt to separate fact from legend. The point of view of most chroniclers is highly localised, to the extent that many anonymous chroniclers can be sited in individual
abbeys. It is impossible to say how many chronicles exist, as the many ambiguities in the definition of the genre make it impossible to draw clear distinctions of what should or should not be included. However, the
Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle lists some 2,500 items written between 300 and 1500 AD. ==Citation of entries==