Abundances in ellipticals traced by globular clusters

A brief overview of why and how globular clusters can be used to trace the star-formation history of galaxies is given. We list the advantages of usin g globular clusters, before discussing some practical/observational aspects . We finish by emphasizing the currently most interesting aspect of this re search, namely the presence of multiple globular cluster populations around many (if not all) galaxies, and the possible origin of these clusters.