Hello, you are not signed on. |
|
![[ Blogs.starwars.com ]](/static/skin/default/img/title_banners/site_banner.jpg "[ Blogs.starwars.com ]")     
|
 | Star Wars Calendars |
Hey, I warned you I was into stuff like this. There was some discussion on in-universe calendarization on the message boards at theforce.net. Basically, if you lived in the SW universe, what year would it be? Here's a summary of calendars, either in the past or in current use:
Calendar #1: Republic calendar
Uses 25,000 BBY as its zero point, to correspond with the establishment of the Republic. Honestly, I've never actually seen this calendar being used in SW literature, but it seems logical that this would have existed at some point.
Calendar #2: Sidereal Period
Uses 5,689 BBY as its zero point. Reader Pfluegermeister reminded me of this calendar, which is only referenced once, in the 1970s Star Wars Sunday newspaper comic strips by Russ Manning. In the comic, a supercomputer named Mistress Mnemos speaks the line, "Luke Skywalker... File: ZC-1905-FT, Section: OC-6492, Human: 10th Degree, Born: Sidereal Era, AS-5670... of Master and Mistress Tan Skywalker." Putting aside "Tan Skywalker" for a sec, this sets the zero point at 5,689 BBY, but raises the question of what would have occurred during that year to start the Sidereal Period. (Wish I'd remembered this in time for the New Essential Chronology.)
Calendar #3: Ruusan Reformations
Uses 1,000 BBY as its zero point, which helps explain the references in the prequels to the Republic existing for "a thousand years" (as opposed to 25,000 years). This calendar originated in HoloNet News (but isn't actually used by HoloNet News...see below).
Calendar #4: Great Re-Synchronization
Uses 35 BBY as its zero point. This is the in-universe dating system used by HoloNet News (and before that, West End Games' Galaxywide NewsNets). I think Zahn's Pre-Empire dates correspond to this, but it's been a while. This date originated with an old timeline in the 2nd edition of the Guide to the Star Wars Universe that placed the end of the Clone Wars at 35 BBY. Since that date is no longer valid, HoloNet News retconned it into the "Great Re-Synchronization." Years that occur prior to the establishment of this event are referrred to by the abbreviation "BrS" (for "Before Re-Synchronization) under the rules of this system.
Calendar #5: Battle of Yavin
Uses 0 BBY (i.e. Star Wars: A New Hope) as its zero point. This is the most widely-used timeline since it's easy to grasp. It is also apparently used in-universe, if the Essential Chronology is any guide.
There are really only two timelines being used in current practice: #4 (which I'll call the Fanboy Timeline) and #5. #4 is almost like a secret code and will continue to be used in fannish sources like HoloNet News, but the smart money is on #5, since that's the one that everyone (particularly SW authors and licensees) will gravitate toward.
Almost forgot: there are two distinct "year" calendars:
Year Calendar #1: 10-month year
This was introduced by West End Games, apparently in an effort to make SW seem more "spacey." It causes lots of problems in figuring out where to place events separated by months, since Lucasfilm doesn't really use it, and new authors generally have no idea it was ever introduced.
Year Calendar #2: 12-month year
This is exactly like our calendar here on earth. The smart money is on this calendar, because it allows LFL to place events without having to calculate the result.
Dan
(writing projects and current releases)
|
 |
http://blogs.starwars.com/danwallace/3 |
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Jun 22, 2005 5:31 PM
Dear Dan,
Not to sound too fanboy-ish (though that's hardly a sin on this blog), but if you say the Republic calendar dates from 25,000 BBY, does that mean that the Republic was established in exactly that year, or are we rounding off until an exact year BBY is decided on? Hope you can answer that for me.
Ciao!
|
 |
Dan Wallace
Continuity, Criticisms, and Captain Panaka
|
date Posted: Jun 22, 2005 8:17 PM
Pfluegermeister (whew)... No, it doesn't mean the calendar was established in exactly 25,000 BBY. That's just an approximation.
It does lead to interesting stuff, however. If Tales of the Jedi happened in 4000 BBY (clearly an approximation) and Dark Lords of the Sith happened three years later, can 3,997 BBY still be called an "approximation"?
Dan
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Jun 23, 2005 10:20 PM
Dear Dan,
I know, the name's a mouthful, isn't it? Someday I'll tell you where it came from...
Thanks for the clarification. It's a shame that with events preceeding the founding of the Republic set firmly on the calendar (Xim the Despot comes to mind), this pivotal event is still unset, beyond the round-off number. Same with the founding of the Jedi and other landmarks. I would hope that, with the New Essential Chronology, some questions will be answered, if only to settle the matter. Unless someone's going to write stories in this period (a good idea), it's good to put these matters to bed.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Jun 23, 2005 10:20 PM
Speaking of Tales of the Jedi dates and approximations, I understand that the first two issues, Ulic Qel-Droma and the Beast Wars of Onderon, take place in 4000 BBY, while the following three, The Saga of Nomi Sunrider, take place in 3999 BBY. Later, when the five issues were made into a trade paperback, both were placed in the same year, 4000 BBY. Which is more accurate?
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Jun 23, 2005 10:22 PM
My feeling is that neither date you cited, either Tales or Lords, is approximate, but a specific date. If every story in that era were set in 4000 BBY, then I'd agree, it's all rounded off. But if each successive story is set relative to that first year, 4000, 3999, 3998, and so on, then you have a specific year that just happens to be a digit with a lot of zeroes next to it. And, remember, that to the inhabitants of the Star Wars galaxy, TOTJ wouldn't take place in 4000 BBY, but, depending on the calendar, as follows:
Calendar 1: circa 21,000, Old Republic Date
Calendar 2: circa 3,000, Pre-Reformation Date
Calendar 3: 3966, Pre-ReSynchronization Date
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Jun 23, 2005 10:23 PM
We should also remember Zahn's invention of the Imperial calendar in Dark Force Rising. Zahn didn't know Palpatine would be crowned Emperor in 19 BBY when he created it, but I think he meant it to have that event as its starting point. By that reckoning, the date of TOTJ as, say, Luke and Leia would have known it, would be 3982 Pre-Empire Date.
Just some food for thought.
Arrivederci!
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Aug 02, 2005 9:15 PM
I may have just made your job harder, Dan. Remember the 1979 Russ Manning strips, where C-3PO speaks to a computer, Mistress Mnemos? When Luke's name is mentioned, Mnemos recites the following (italics are mine):
Mnemos: Luke Skywalker... File: ZC-1905-FT, Section: OC-6492, Human: 10th Degree, Born: Sidereal Era, AS-5670... of Master and Mistress Tan Skywalker, on -
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Aug 02, 2005 9:15 PM
Pablo Hidalgo and Abel Pena recently brought "Tan Skywalker" into continuity, but what is this date reference? A sidereal period refers to the exact time it takes for an object to make a full orbit around the Sun, relative to the stars. Is this another way of saying a year? Is there another calendar? If so, it would date from the year 5689 B.B.Y., adding the date of Luke's birth in 19 B.B.Y. to 5670. But what happened then to start it, and why would Mnemos favor this calendar over others?
More food for thought.
C-Ya!
|
| |
SelanaCreed
I find your lack of faith disturbing
|
date Posted: Sep 12, 2005 4:54 AM
Calendar #2: Ruusan Reformations
Uses 1,000 BBY as its zero point, which helps explain the references in the prequels to the Republic existing for "a thousand years" (as opposed to 25,000 years).
Perhaps I got it wrong, but wasn't it a 1.000 generations? I recall Palpatine saying something like this at the beginning of AOTC... 
Now I'm really confused.
|
 |
MasterObi-Wan
My little slice of the GFFA
|
date Posted: Sep 24, 2005 8:50 PM
SelanaCreed, your confusion is pretty understandable.
In A New Hope, Obi-Wan says that the Jedi were the guardians of peace and justice in the old Republic for "over a thousand generations".
In Attack of the Clones, however, Palpatine states:
"I will not let this Republic, which has stood for a thousand years, be split in two."
This is complicated by Sio Bibble's statement later in the film:
"There hasn't been a full-scale war since the formation of the Republic"
Of course, the Sith War, the Jedi Civil War, and other conflicts from the EU seem pretty full-scale to me. Hence the inclusion in the Chronology of the Ruusan Reformations (Named after the last great battle between the Jedi and Sith before the Rule of Two).
|
 |
Halagad
Only Sith Deal In Absolutes!
|
date Posted: Oct 30, 2005 1:21 AM
Cool blog!
The aristocrats of Tapani sector also use a unique calendar. This is from the Lords of the Expanse boxed set.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 01, 2005 9:30 PM
I just noticed the shout-out you gave to my Sidereal calendar mention. Thank you, Dan! I would have noticed it sooner, perhaps, except that I live in Naples, Florida and a little windy hurricaney thing named Wilma shut my power down for a week. But, uh, everything's perfectly all right now. We're fine. We're all fine here now, thank you. How are you?
And to put calendars aside, I once promised to tell you where the name came from. My last name's Pflueger, and during college my friend made a reference to the 1970 Rankin-Bass television special Santa Claus is Coming to Town and named me Pfluegermeister Meisterpflueger, after the evil Burgermeister Meisterburger of Sombertown, who had outlawed toys.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 01, 2005 9:39 PM
Since I'm here, some questions: Since we're more often using the 12-month calendar, and you say it's exactly like our good-old Gregorian calendar, does that mean that there's those subtle differences in months that make some months have 28 days, others have 31 days, and so on? And does a standard week have seven days like ours, or five days like the West End Games 10-month calendar? And is a year 365 like ours, or 368 like the 10-month? Just stuff I'd hoped to find out (give answer priority to the number of days in a week, if you please) 
I'll be asking questions about the New Essential Chronology in the appropriate blog soon enough. Be ready! 
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 01, 2005 9:40 PM
I should have said "is a year 365 days like ours..." Oopsie!
Best regards, Dan, and good job with the NEC.
|
|
Dan Wallace
Continuity, Criticisms, and Captain Panaka
|
date Posted: Nov 02, 2005 6:13 AM
And does a standard week have seven days like ours, or five days like the West End Games 10-month calendar? And is a year 365 like ours, or 368 like the 10-month?
In my opinion, the unspoken guiding principle behind the 12-month calendar is "as close to our own calendar as possible so that no significant conversion calculations are required." This would translate into 7-day weeks and 365-day years. (But in keeping with this KISS philosophy, we'd probably forget about leap years.)
|
 |
the_Whill
|
date Posted: Nov 08, 2005 5:27 PM
If I'd caught this blog way sooner, I'd have been the one to bring up the Siderial Era calendar. It's my favorite as it's the oldest in-universe calendar. I never liked the 35-year-before-ANH calendar, because from its first appearance I knew it was based on a mistake. I also never liked the calendar with the "0 year" on ANH as an in-universe calendar. I do like your previously-unused calendar beginning @ ~25k years before ANH. But I think there's one more previously-unstated calendar you've overlooked: one that begins at 19 years before ANH. It makes sense that such an Imperial Calendar would exist and be in use during the time of the Empire.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 16, 2005 10:22 PM
Greetings and salutations, Dan! I may have just found a new detail for your discussion. After flipping through my older books for some obscure fact, I happened to find the Star Wars Adventure Journal no. 10. In it (p. 229), a newsnet article describes a day known as Kagstag. The article describes it as a day happening early in the week, presumably before the third day, since the article is dated 37:4:3 and refers to the day as happening "early this week."
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 16, 2005 10:26 PM
Could Kagstag be a day name on the official calendar? If so, which one? The events in the article take place on Onderon, so it may be an Onderon day. But the article was intended for a galaxywide readership (wherever HoloNet Free Republic is read, at any rate), so it may be a day the entire galactic community has in common. But then, is it the 10-month calendar or the 12-month one? Back then, it was all West End Games, and they used the 10-month. But this may not mean Kagstag doesn't work for the 12-month system.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Nov 16, 2005 10:30 PM
What does this mean for the galactic calendar? It may probably mean that all days in the week (whether 5, as in the old WEG system, or 7, as seems to be the case nowadays) end in the suffix -tag, the German word for day. Exactly what got a day named with the prefix Kags-, I can't guess. Does this refer to a mythological figure, or a historical figure, or what? You may have to decide on that, since all days in the week may be named from the same category, as our days are here on Earth.
You may want to look up the reference as I cited it, to judge for yourself, or perhaps readers could make additional comments.
Hope this helps!
|
 |
TheSithEmpire
|
date Posted: Feb 16, 2006 8:44 AM
With my assistance and that of fellow chronologer, Dark Horse recently updated their timeline, including the Tales of the Jedi series which was given a more accurate date of 3998 to 3996 BBY (Knights... to Sith War). I've adopted DH's new date on my own timeline as it at last specifies the approximation and corrects the formerly erroneous four-year span that had somehow crept in on their timeline back in the day.
|
|
TheSithEmpire
|
date Posted: Feb 16, 2006 8:49 AM
As to WEG's obscure information and errata, it would be the height of arrogance to expect any author or editor to know or remember (if they ever did know) the thousands of bits of minutia that WEG authors invented in their mistaken endeavour to define every single aspect of the SW Universe in the late 80's, especially as that information was disseminated throughout one hundred and seventy-three mostly non-fiction titles!! Only the most stringent of readers (not to mention affluent) with the most photographic of memories might recall (let alone find) any given piece of information spread throughout such disparate sources.
In all honesty, I think a lot of that obscure material is best left forgotten.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Feb 19, 2006 9:03 PM
I don't expect any author or editor to know everything. But if I find something relevant to the subject at hand (in this case, calendars) I inform said author/editor so that they will know. It's not necessary for any one person to have all this at hand; the community as a whole pools its resources. In any case, neither of us has the right or responsibility to decide if WEG material stays or goes. That, I call the height of arrogance. If anyone should decide, it's Dan and those like him who do this officially. To make informed decisions, he needs all the facts, no matter how obscure. Usually, he's glad to have them, and I've found that usually, he already knows them. He's that good.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Feb 19, 2006 9:13 PM
The exception is, when we make our own chronologies of the saga, we can make our own decisions about what to keep and what to lose. They're based on our own opinions, which are our right to have. If, for instance, you want WEG or, say, Marvel material forgotten, it's forgotten. For official stuff, we don't decide, but as your recent experience with Dark Horse shows (congratulations on that, by the way), your contributions help official people make decisions. And didn't Dan get this blog going for just such fruitful discussion?
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Feb 19, 2006 9:27 PM
Finally, maybe the WEG material is best forgotten, but the fact is, the people who do this officially clearly haven't forgotten it, since in the HoloNet News articles they've been using the "obscure" dating system, with some modifications, from WEG's Galaxywide NewsNets articles, first used in the exact same sources (the Adventure Journals) I cited for the Kagstag reference. In fact, they've been using it since 2002. If the precedent's been established, why not run with it?
|
 |
JMMC
|
date Posted: Mar 02, 2006 11:46 AM
A NEW DATING SYSTEM APPEARS! In the new Knights of the Old Republic/Rebellion #0 "flipbook", there's a Holonet News-like article in the Knights era. It's a page from a Taris news site, and the date on it is 39:56:1434. And the story is set 3,964 years pre-ANH! It's possible this is some calendar specific to Taris, but it's still a new calendar!
|
|
JMMC
|
date Posted: Mar 02, 2006 11:46 AM
Re Pflugermeister's comments:
For a time, in my chronology I tried the 10-month year, but it's since become obvious, that authors are following a 12-month calendar. But, it's also obvious that the WEG dating convention (ignoring the 10/12 month question) is being used. Leland Chee's blog gives specific dates for the prequels, and I still consider the WEG dates given for ANH and TESB accurate. So, on my site ANH is set in the 3rd month of the year, and any time a story is set X months after ANH, I do the math accordingly.
JMM
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Mar 02, 2006 6:52 PM
Same here, JMMC. For instance, if a comic is dated eight months after ANH, I date it as 35:11. And, by the way, part of the WEG convention still in use seems to be that the calendar year is 368 days long. This can be concluded from the book Republic Commando: Triple Zero, as seen in this excerpt:
Republic assault ship Fearless... 367 days after Geonosis... "...a security forces spokesman said today that the proximity to tomorrow's first anniversary of the Battle of Geonosis was significant . . ."
That's pretty clear math to me.
|
| |
Pfluegermeister
|
date Posted: Mar 02, 2006 6:59 PM
Just for nitpickers, this indicates that this passage in the book takes place on 14:5:21, 367 days after the date of the battle on Geonosis, 13:5:22, which itself is seven days after the beginning of Attack of the Clones on 13:5:16. Other dates in the book can presumably be reckoned from that.
|
- Please log in to post comments
|
|
 |
