[3][4] But several modern scholars have concluded he was not the author, because the Chronicle and known works of Nestor barely align, and frequently contradict each other in terms of style and contents.

[3][4] Given the authorship controversy, some scholars prefer calling him Nestor "the Hagiographer", to be identified with the two hagiographies which they do agree that he did write.

[5] The only other detail of his life that is reliably known is that he was commissioned with two other monks to find the relics of St. Theodosius of Kiev, a mission which he fulfilled successfully.

[8] Another reason given for belief in Nestorian authorship was the word нестера in the opening lines of the Khlebnikov Codex (discovered in 1809[9]), which some readers took to refer to Nestor "the Chronicler".

"[11] The word is not found in any of the other five main versions of the PVL,[11][a] and is thus an interpolation inserted into the text by an editor, perhaps guessing at the author's name.