The following list presents some 1100 composers arranged into a timeline based purely on their date of birth. For convenience sake, the list has been divided into nine sections with general, and somewhat arbitrary, descriptive headings. The divisions simply break the list up into more manageable sections, and serve as a reminder as to what "period" the composer may be associated with. The divisions are not meant to provide distinct stylistic definitions. Any individual composer, especially on the boundaries, may be misclassified.