chronicle
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
chroniclesimple
-
chroniclessimple
-
have chronicledperfect
-
has chronicledperfect
-
am chroniclingprogressive
-
are chroniclingprogressive
-
is chroniclingprogressive
-
have been chroniclingperfect progressive
-
has been chroniclingperfect progressive
Past
-
chronicledsimple
-
had chronicledperfect
-
was chroniclingprogressive
-
were chroniclingprogressive
-
had been chroniclingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of chronicle
1275–1325; Middle English cronicle < Anglo-French, variant, with -le -ule, of Old French cronique < Medieval Latin cronica (feminine singular), Latin chronica (neuter plural) < Greek chroniká annals, chronology; see chronic
Explanation
To chronicle an event is to record it as it happens, and a chronicle is a record of those events. If your grandmother took the time to chronicle the details of her 1910 journey to Japan, you can read her chronicle today. To chronicle something is to describe past or current events. Chronicle is related to chronological and comes from the Greek ta khronika, which means “annals of time.” Events are usually chronicled in the order in which they occurred. The noun chronicle is a record of things that happened — told in chronological order, like the diary you kept in elementary school. It is a chronicle of those years.
Vocabulary lists containing chronicle
It's About Time: Chron and Temp
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"The Gift of the Magi"
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The Skin I'm In
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The Rolling Stones were there to chronicle the impending hangover.
From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 10, 2026
"The bigger vision is to stitch all of this together into a coherent timeline," Hennawi said: "a quasar chronicle of the first billion years."
From Science Daily • Jul. 9, 2026
American museums that chronicle slavery increasingly focus on enslaved people’s community-building skills and entrepreneurial abilities.
From Salon • Jun. 19, 2026
In the immediate aftermath of the 14th-century Black Death, a highly educated Venetian wrote a chronicle claiming that the plague had wiped out a third of his city’s population.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 12, 2026
By early 1937, the lab was regularly producing material for “two dozen physicists, half a dozen biologists, and several chemists,” as an early chronicle reported.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
