The previous four chapters have largely been concerned with the process of recording contemporary events in Irish chronicles, but it is clear that earlier sections of the annals, describing the distant past, were also a focus of Irish chroniclers' activities. This chapter will concentrate on one major phase of change which took place in the common source of AU and the Clonmacnoise group which ended in A.D. 911. In this phase a number of texts from outside Ireland were used to provide items in the section from A.D. 431, when Palladius was sent to Ireland, to A.D. 720. These items provided the Irish chronicles with a sequence of popes from 431 to about 610, a series of Byzantine emperors from 431 to 720, and records of a few other selected events from the Mediterranean world. In a section of the chronicles which, before the late seventh century, probably did not describe many events per annal, these new items would have significantly altered the content of the chronicle. The intention of this chapter is to identify the sources of these items, explain how they were included, and discuss the picture of the past that resulted. Not only should this produce evidence for the context of the chronicles at the time of inclusion, but it will also provide the basis for the study of the annals' chronology in chapter 6.