Abstract details

I review efforts to determine the ages and chemical compositions of early-type galaxies from their integrated spectra. Aftre briefly reviewing the history of integrated light analyses, we consider how reliably the light-weighted mean ages and chemical compositions of galaxies can be extracted from current state-of-the-art population synthesis modelling and observational data. Particular attention is given to determining {\it relative} ages and metallicities , as opposed to absolute accuracy in zeropoint. Finally, we consider efforts to move beyond light-weighted {\it mean} ages and metallicities, specifically, to constrain star formation histories with multiple episodes of star formation.