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Standard Measures of Time
| “ | Reckoning of time on the Planes has been largely standardized through continued contact and commerce between realms. This standardization is aided by the fact that the Planes seem to conform to each other in terms of duration of the day, year, and so forth.
Conversions are as follows-
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| ~ Nils Tisen of House Grass,Saity'rin Noble and Natural Philosopher, Excerpt from "A Discourse in Natural Philosphy", 2nd Ed. |
The Titanean Calendar
According to the accounts of Ephemera, when Fae Sanctum was at the height of its glory, and the gleaming city of old U'luksandria and its Great Library stood as the center of Planar learning and philosophy, a standardized calendar was proposed and agreed to by representatives of the Races of the Planes.
During the First Protemic Council, it was declared that the counting of years would begin counting forward from that year onward with all previous reckoning to be discarded and all previous dates to be discarded in favor of the new calendar. All years before would be so marked counting backwards from the date of the Protemic Revelation, i.e. B.R., Before the Revelation. All years after would be marked, A.R. or After the Revelation. A great deal of effort was put forth to correctly recalculate and update the existing historical literature of the time to reflect this new system. However, the majority of this effort along with the bulk of the works of Ephemera have not survived to the present era.
Regardless, the B.R. and A.R. naming conventions remain in use by the learned circles on the Planes, and the yearly reckoning has become a basic convention throughout the Planes, regardless of whether the origin is known.
Ages follows a cycle of recursive Zodiac order. The Epochs follow an obscure Deitific Cycle, tracking generally with the order of Diety births.
By all known reckoning the current year is 3814 A.R., The Age of Maru'i, The Xymbrylic Epoch.
Time on the Planes
Time on the Planes is more or less objective to each Plane. This is to say the passage of time is perceived as constant and, apart from any perceptual changes as a result of divine or magical interventions, moves at the same speed on each Plane simultaneously.
Most Planar Natural Philosophers have concluded that time on the Planes as a whole run parallel and at constant rates in respect to each other. This is to say if one were to travel to Abyss and spend one day there, after returning to their original Plane only one day will have passed there as well.
There are tales that suggest certain Portal phenomena may interfere with this continuity of time, linking different points not only between different Planes but also between different times. The majority of these "time slips" are reported by those traveling to and from Fae Sanctum. The tales generally follow the same narrative: An unwise traveler is led or lured to Fae Sanctum, and spends a day or night there, only to return to their home Plane finding months or years have passed. It is proposed that this is not a function of actual time change. Rather the result of magic, worked by mischievous Fae'ri, that alter the memories or perception of the unwary traveler.
The Problem of Time and Planar Geography
The Sun (Solaranu), the Moon (Luna), and the Stars (the Za'rin) can be seen in the heavens of all the Planes, with the exception of the Shadow Vale and the Elemental Plane of Earth. The movements of these bodies mark the passage of time: the Sun marks the length of days, and the Moon and Stars mark the passage of the year and era. However, due to the unusual flat geometry of the Planes, (see Funtional Infinite Geography), as well as the presence of the Sun, Moon and Stars on multiple Planes simultaneously, there is a great deal of debate about the motion of the heavens. The Stars are merely outshone by the Sun during the day, but from where, ask the Natural Philosophers, does the Sun and Moon go when they set? From where do they arrive?
There are competing schools of thought: Fleetonic, Maruic, and Tabaetic.
According to Marua's accounting Fleeto, (a Pix'i philosopher that died in the fourty-first century B.R.), there is not a single Sun, Moon and Stars, but five sets that each individually occupy their respective Planes, and which magically materialize upon rising and de-materialize at setting. This remained the prevailing wisdom until Marua.
Marua, a Taro'i (Waterborn) scholar of Fleeto in the twenty-third century B.R. accepted the concept of five sets of parallel heavens, but rejected the notion of magical appearance and disappearance. Marin proposed that while the Planes seemed flat and infinite, the infinite quality was simply mortal ignorance arising from never reaching the end of what she believed to be a round flat disc that constituted each Plane. Thus the Sun, Moon and Stars rose and set while revolving around their respective plane.
Tabaet, a Belzab'rin (Demonic) wizard of the fourth century A.R. proposes a model radically different than its predecessors. Tabaet proposed that the four Elemental Planes, Fae Sanctum, and Abyss occupied not different spaces but the same space, unable to see each other or interact due to different vibration patterns, Portals thus were places where the vibrations harmonized temporarily. Thus, Tabaet agreed with Marua that the Sun, Moon, and Stars revolved around the Planes, but they were in fact the same Sun, Moon and Stars seen simultaneously in all Planes, regardless of vibration. The writings of Tabaet are generally seen as heresy by most religions, and few can claim to understand them, (see Tabaetan Cosmology.