Calendars of Andara

In the world of Andara the year is broken up into twelve months named after seasons: Spring Waxing, Spring, Spring Waning, Summer Waxing, Summer, Summer Waning, Autumn Waxing, Autumn, Autumn Waning, Winter Waxing, Winter, Winter Waning. The months follow a lunar cycle and are each 25 days long for a total of 300 days in the year.

The month begins with the First Quarter phase and ends with the New Moon phase. Each phase lasts for about 6 days but again the full lunar cycle is 25 days long. Thus there is no real concept of “week”, planning being broken up into either days or months. The new Omnian religion observes religious rites every fifth day and slowly the concept of “week” is being explored and introduced to society in this manner.

One other thing to note is that the days of Andara are all the same length; they do not grow shorter in the winter or longer in the summer.

There are several calendars that the party would be aware of. The most obvious would be the Valian Calendar which is the one the Seven Vales operates on. The Valian Calendar begins with the founding of Boarlanding at year zero. Events after the founding are listed as SV (the years of the Seven Vales) and events before are PSV (Prior to the Seven Vales). For reference the Knights met Nolan in the Sleeping Dragon (following the 10 year break) on the last day of Autumn Waning, the 25^th, in the year 345 SV.

There is also a church calendar that begins with the finding of the Libram by Valnar in the year zero. Events after are labeled AD (After the Discovery) and events before are BD (Before Discovery). The same day in the paragraph above occurs in the year 223 AD.

The Knights would also be aware of a Chovalian Calendar and the Old World Calendar.  While they would not have this specific information at this time (publishing at Session 26) the Choval Calendar begins with the founding of the Choval Empire and denotes with IR (Imperial Reign) and BE (Before Empire).  The year 345 SV is the year 1014 IR in the Chovalian Calendar. The Old World Calendar supposedly began at the landing of the first human ships on the southern continent and does not recognize years before the event and thus has no post script.  Occasionally scholars will label it with the post script OWC, but only when comparing dates with other calendars. The year 345 SV is the year 3178.

Finally there was once a Calendar called the Desert Empire Calendar, but as it was the only one that did not start its new year on the first day of Spring Waxing (starting instead on the first rain of summer – making for irregular length years) it fell into disuse after a few centuries.

The common man and even minor nobles rarely pay attention to calendars or years, instead marking the passing of the seasons. It is not unusal for the answer to the question "How old are you" to be "I've seen 40 winters."