ANNALS

Gli annali sono documenti d'archivio che narrano i maggiori eventi storici e le catastrofi naturali più rilevanti che coinvolgono un popolo. Il nome deriva dal fatto che originariamente erano ordinati di anno in anno, ma in età moderna il termine si applica indipendentemente dal metodo di ordinamento.

Erano spesso redatti e conservati da autorità religiose. Un esempio sono gli annales pontificum dell’antica Roma: ciascun anno era indicato con i nomi dei due alti magistrati eponimi in carica. Da essi deriva l'annalistica medioevale. Gli annali romani rappresentano, in qualche modo, gli albori di un'attitudine storiografica.

Annals (Latin annālis, yearly from annus, a year) are a concise form of historical representation which record events chronologically, year by year.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines annals as "a narrative of events written year by year". The historian Hayden White discusses annals in contrast to chronicles and history, two other forms of historical representation. In contrast to the chronicle, annals do not organize events by topics, such as the reigns of kings. Unlike history, the annals do not conclude and tie up all the loose ends, but simply terminate. The annalist leaves the recorded events unexplained and often one event has as equal weight as another. Furthermore, annalists represent events as happening to humankind, rather than human beings causing events.

CHRONICLE

Generally a chronicle (Latin: chronica, from Greek χρονικά, from χρόνος, chronos, "time") is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events, the purpose being the recording of events that occurred, seen from the perspective of the chronicler. This is in contrast to a narrative or history, which sets selected events in a meaningful interpretive context and excludes those the author does not see as important.

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. If the chronicles deal with events year by year, they are often called annals. A chronicle which traces world history is called a universal chronicle.

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 most important English chronicles are the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, started under the patronage of King Alfred in the 9th century and continued until the 12th century, and the Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland (1577–87) by Raphael Holinshed and other writers.