Ralph de Diceto

Ralph de Diceto or Ralph of Diss (Latin: Radulfus de Diceto; c. 1120 – c. 1202) was archdeacon of Middlesex, dean of St Paul's Cathedral (from c. 1180), and the author of a major chronicle divided into two parts—often treated as separate works—the Abbreviationes Chronicorum (Latin for "Abbreviations of Chronicles") from the birth of Jesus to the 1140s and the Imagines or Ymagines Historiarum ("Images of Histories") from that point until 1202.

Dicetum may equally well be a Latinized form of Dissay, Dicy, or Dizy, place names in Maine, Picardy, Burgundy, and Champagne.

Apart from his selection in 1166 as the envoy of the English bishops when they protested against the excommunications launched by Becket, which he characteristically neglects to record, he remained in the background.

In this office, he distinguished himself by careful management of its estates, by restoring the discipline of its chapter, and by building a deanery house at his own expense.

[3] It is divided into two parts, often treated as separate works: the Abbreviationes Chronicorum ("Abbreviations of Chronicles") up to around 1147 and the Imagines or Ymagines Historiarum ("Images of Histories") from then until 1202.

The latter, beginning as a compilation from Robert de Monte and the letters of Bishop Foliot, becomes an original authority c. 1172 and a contemporary record c. 1181.