In linguistics and rhetoric, the historical present or historic present (also called dramatic present or narrative present) refers to the employment of the present tense when narrating past events. It is widely used in writing about history in Latin (where it is sometimes referred to by its Latin name, praesens historicum) and some modern European languages; in English it is used above all in historical chronicles (listing a series of events); it is also used in fiction, for "hot news" (as in headlines), and in everyday conversation (Huddleston & Pullum 2002: 129–131). In conversation, it is particularly common with "verbs of communication" such as tell, write, and say (and in colloquial uses, go) (Leech 2002: 7). "Historic present" is the form recognised by the Oxford English Dictionary, whereas "historical present" is the form in Merriam Webster.