Holinshed's Chronicles

The title page of the 1577 first edition of Holinshed's Chronicles

Holinshed's Chronicles, also known as Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, a collaborative work, was planned as a comprehensive description of British history. The first edition, published in 1577 in two volumes, was divided into four parts (each part described on the title page as a volume): England to the Norman Conquest, Scotland to 1571, and Ireland to 1547; and England from William the Conqueror to the present time. A similarly structured second edition in 1587 brought the narrative history of each country up to 1586, and added further cross-references to sources.

The Chronicles have been a source of interest because of their extensive links to Shakespearean history, as well as King Lear, Macbeth and Cymbeline. Recent studies of the Chronicles have focused on an inter-disciplinary approach; numerous literary scholars have studied the traditional historiographical materials through a literary lens, with a focus on how contemporary men and women would have read historical texts.

The Chronicles would have been a primary source for many other literary writers of the Renaissance such as Christopher Marlowe, Edmund Spenser and George Daniel.

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