Template:SIP The Galactic Standard Calendar was the standard measurement of time in the galaxy. It centered around the Coruscant Solar cycle, which was 368 days long (one day consisting of 24 standard hours).[1] Numerous epochs were used to determine calendar eras. The most recent of these calendar eras used the Battle of Yavin as its epoch, or "year zero". BBY stands for Before the Battle of Yavin, and ABY stands for After the Battle of Yavin.[2]
History
The calendar, also referred to as the Coruscant Standard Calendar, was the main calendar in use in the galaxy since the time of the Galactic Republic. Presumably the Old Republic dated years from its founding in 25,053 BBY.[source?] Throughout time, however, historians have used numerous galaxy changing events as epoch to mark new calendar eras.[source?]
One particularly notable epoch is the Treaty of Coruscant of 3,653 BBY. The calendar eras before and after this event (referred to as "BTC" and "ATC", respectively) were popularized by the famous Jedi historian Gnost-Dural. His holographic records, which used this numbering system, contained some of the most complete records of numerous important events such as the Hundred-Year Darkness, the Great Hyperspace War, the Great Sith War, the Mandalorian Wars, the Jedi Civil War, and the Great Galactic War against the returned Sith Empire. For this reason, this method of numbering years remains important to historians.Expression error: Unexpected > operator.
Other notable epochs used were the Ruusan Reformation of 1,000 BBY, the Great ReSynchronization of 35 BBY, the formation of the Galactic Empire in 19 BBY, and the Battle of Endor in 4 ABY.[source?] With the exception of the Ruusan Reformation, the later epochs were all within the same century and stemmed from the events and upheavals surrounding the rise and fall of the Galactic Empire. They were short-lived and used by various historians at the time. In 25 ABY, the New Republic commissioned the New Republic Historical Council to re-standardize the Galactic Calendar. The historical council chose the Battle of Yavin, instead of the Battle of Endor, calling the former the more significant galactic event. From that point on, the year in which the Battle of Yavin occurred was the epoch used for the dating system.[2] It was used by the New Republic, as well as the subsequent Galactic Alliance. Many regions, however, kept their own calendars, including the Imperial Remnant.[source?]
Time measurement
The calendar was based on the size and rotation of the planet Coruscant. It was a luno-solar calendar based both on Coruscant's orbit around its sun, and the orbit of its primary satellite Centax-1. The standard unit of time was the standard second. Sixty standard seconds made up each standard minute, and sixty minutes made up each standard hour. Each day consisted of 24 standard hours. A standard week was 5 standard days, and each month was seven weeks (making 35 standard days each month). A standard year was 368 days, composed of ten months, three fete weeks, and three holidays. As the Hyperdrive Theory allowed space travelers to bypass relativity, a single duration of time passed at all locations equally over a given interval.[source?]
In the galaxy:[3]
- 60 seconds = 1 minute
- 60 minutes = 1 hour
- 24 hours = 1 day
- 5 days = 1 week
- 7 weeks = 1 month
- 35 days = 1 month
- 368 days = 1 year
- 10 months + 3 festival weeks + 3 holidays = 1 year
Days of the week
Behind the scenes
BBY/ABY is sometimes known as BSW4/ASW4, which means "before/after Star Wars Episode IV". The BSW4/ASW4 notation was used in the timeline of the second edition of A Guide to the Star Wars Universe and The Essential Guide to Vehicles and Vessels. The Essential Guide to Planets and Moons eschewed any acronyms altogether and listed dates as YEARS, with 0 YEARS being the events depicted in Star Wars Episode IV. The first Essential Guide to use the BBY/ABY notation was The Essential Chronology. This practice was continued in The Essential Guide to Alien Species and beyond.
From an in-universe perspective, the overthrow of the Emperor makes more sense as an epochal marker than victory at the Battle of Yavin. Indeed, promotional material surrounding the Thrawn trilogy and other contemporary works reckoned time in how much had passed since the Battle of Endor. This practice began to change some time after the release of The Truce at Bakura.
Thursday[4] and Saturday have also been mentioned as days in the Expanded Universe, and Sunday[5] as a type of school.
It is known that the beginning of the in-universe calendar does not correspond with BBY/ABY as in Fury. It is stated that a new year has begun, yet the book still takes place in 40 ABY, just as all of the previous books in Legacy of the Force do.[6] The very next novel in the series, Revelation, occurs in 41 ABY.
The Essential Atlas featured years of 12 months and months of 30 or 31 days, as did The New Essential Chronology.
It should be noted that there is a difference of four months between the Galactic Standard and the Great ReSynchronization, for instance, According to the early, Ben Skywalker was born on the fifth month of year 25 ABY. In the case of the latter, he was born on the ninth month of year 61.
Sources
- Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game, Second Edition, Revised and Expanded
- Lords of the Expanse
- Player's Guide to Tapani
RM&S Debates Calendar Reform — HoloNet News Vol. 531 #45 (content now obsolete; backup link)- The New Essential Chronology
- The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia
- Dining at Dex's
Notes and references
- ↑
"Coruscant: Center of the Empire" (original article link) on Wizards.com (content now obsolete; backup link)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 The New Essential Chronology
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedStar Wars Timeline Gold - ↑ The Last of the Jedi: Master of Deception
- ↑ Star Wars 7: New Planets, New Perils
- ↑ Fury