CHRONICLE. The histor ical works written in the middle ages are variously designated "histories," "annals," or "chron icles" (from Gr. Xpovos, time) ; it is difficult, however, to give an exact definition of each of these terms, since they do not corre spond to determinate classes of writings. Perhaps the most rea sonable definition is that given by H. F. Delaborde at the )Jcole des Chartes, that chronicles are accounts of a universal character, while annals relate either to a locality, or to a religious community, or even to a whole people, but without attempting to treat of all periods or all peoples. The primitive type, he says, was furnished by Eusebius of Caesarea, who wrote (c. 303) a chronicle in Greek, which was soon translated into Latin and frequently recopied throughout the middle ages ; it embraced the history of the world since the Creation. It is certain, however, that mediaeval authors or scribes were not conscious of any clear distinction between annals and chronicles ; indeed, they often apparently employed the terms indiscriminately.
In any case, chronicles and annals (q.v.) have points of great similarity. Chronicles are accounts generally of an impersonal character, and of ten anonymous, composed of passages copied from sources which the chronicler is seldom at pains to indicate, and of personal recollections the veracity of which remains to be determined. Some of them are written with so little intelligence that the work of composition seems a mere piece of drudgery im posed on the clergy and monks by their superiors. To distinguish what is original from what is borrowed, to separate fact from false hood, and to establish the value of each piece of evidence, is thus a difficult undertaking, and one which has exercised the sagacity of scholars, especially since the '7th century.
The Christian chronicles were first written in the two learned languages, Greek and Latin. At an early stage we have proof of the use of national languages, the most famous instances being the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (q.v.), the most ancient form of which goes back to the 'oth century, and the so-called Chronicle of Nes tor, in Palaeo-Slavonic, written in the Ilth and I2th centuries. In the 13th and 14th centuries the number of chronicles written in the vulgar tongue continued to increase more rapidly on the Con tinent than in England. From the 15th century, with the revived study of Greek and Roman literature, the traditional form of chronicles, as well as of annals, tended to be replaced by another based on the models of antiquity—that of the historical com position combining skilful arrangement with elegance of style. It was not, however, until the 17th century that the traditional form became practically extinct.
See E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der historischen Methode (4th ed., i903) ; H. Bloch, "Geschichte der deutschen Geschichtsschreibung im Mittelalter" in the Handbuch of G. von Below and F. Meinecke (Munich, 1903 seq.) ; Max Jansen, "Historiographie and Quellen der deutschen Geschichte bis 150o," in Alois Meister's Grundriss (Leipzig, 1906) ; and the Introduction (1904) to A. Molinier's Les Sources de l'histoire de France. (C. BEM.)