# Tracking more than one date at a time

**URL:** <https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925>\
**Category:** Scrivener\
**Tags:** support, metadata\
**Created:** [June 25, 2025, 8:07pm UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925 "2025-06-25T20:07:47Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![farouche](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/a183cd/32.png) [@farouche](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/u/farouche)\
**Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 8:07pm UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925/1 "2025-06-25T20:07:47Z")

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I’m writing historical fiction from several POVs. I’ve been using Custom Metadata to track the year for each scene or chapter. However, there are a few instances when a chunk spans multiple years, e.g. a character is remembering her relationship with someone. I haven’t figured out a way to have more than one year as a value. I’ve tried separating by commas (1905, 1906), using a hyphen (1905-1906), or just separating with spaces. Whatever I try, the dates I’ve typed disappear and I get something odd like 2070. Is my better option to use keywords for the year instead of metadata?

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**Author:** ![Vincent\_Vincent](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/user_avatar/forum.literatureandlatte.com/vincent_vincent/32/19680_2.png) [@Vincent\_Vincent](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/u/Vincent_Vincent)\
**Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 8:12pm UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925/2 "2025-06-25T20:12:39Z")

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A text field in a custom metadata would work better, likely.  
(I assume you are currently using the date format.)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![farouche](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/a183cd/32.png) [@farouche](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/u/farouche)\
**Post date:** [June 25, 2025, 8:19pm UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925/3 "2025-06-25T20:19:16Z")

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You’re right; I’m using the date format but only for the year (yyyy) so perhaps text would work.

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**Author:** ![GoalieDad](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/user_avatar/forum.literatureandlatte.com/goaliedad/32/28584_2.png) [@GoalieDad](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/u/GoalieDad)\
**Post date:** [June 26, 2025, 12:07am UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925/4 "2025-06-26T00:07:38Z")

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You could also use a keyword for any scene spanning multiple years and decide if want date from beginning or end of time span. In those scenes put span of years/ months/ etc in synopsis so have info. Could with keyword for span of time make a collection of all scenes in that situation.

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**Author:** ![SCN](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/user_avatar/forum.literatureandlatte.com/scn/32/37507_2.png) [@SCN](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/u/SCN)\
**Post date:** [June 26, 2025, 2:42pm UTC](https://forum.literatureandlatte.com/t/tracking-more-than-one-date-at-a-time/148925/5 "2025-06-26T14:42:49Z")

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Have you look into using [Aeon Timeline](https://www.aeontimeline.com/) for tracking? It syncs beautifully with Scrivener.