Calendar and Timekeeping in The Barefoot Healer

The inhabitants of Felintor, the world of The Barefoot Healer, measure time in a different way from Earth. I tried to write the books in such a way that it wouldn't cause too many difficulties to the reader, but a reference can be useful.

Calendar

The Centadorian calendar dates from the beginning of the reign of King Talfaro and Queen Ashuri. The Barefoot Healer begins in the 506th year of this calendar.

The year is normally 361 days, and every fifth year is a leap year of 362 days. New year occurs on the winter solstice. The year is divided into fortnights (fourteen days), because this is approximately how long Pethandril, the farther of the two moons, takes to complete a cycle of its phases. The final "fortnight" of each year lasts eleven days, or twelve in a leap year.

Fortnights are numbered within the year. Each day of the fortnight is named after, and sacred to, one of the Gods. The final day of the fortnight is sacred to all Gods. The days are named as follows:

The day is divided into six watches, three in daylight and three during the night. First watch starts at dawn. In cities, or anywhere that more precise timekeeping is needed, each watch is further divided into four hours.

The planet has two moons, Angaris (near) and Pethandril (far). Angaris is an icy sphere about 60 miles in diameter, orbiting about 4,000 miles above the surface. It completes an orbit in four hours six minutes, rising in the west and setting in the east. It rises once every five hours two minutes. Because of its low orbit, it appears quite large in the sky - about 1.4 degrees wide, or nearly three times the apparent width of Earth's moon. It reflects a great deal of sunlight onto the planet at night, and is frequently visible in silhouette during the day. However, its closeness also means that the planet eclipses it for part of its orbit, and so the amount of light in the night sky varies dramatically.

The distance to Pethandril, the far moon, has not been accurately determined; estimates vary from 50,000 to 300,000 miles. Astronomers generally assume its orbit to be circular, although the difficulty of reconciling this assumption with all of the observations of it will eventually lead them to realise that the orbit is elliptical. Because of the uncertainty over its distance, its true diameter is not known, but its apparent diameter averages a fifth of a degree. This makes it the brightest object in the night sky after Angaris. It appears big enough to show phases, but not big enough for surface detail to be visible. Its synodic month (the time between successive new moons) is 14.1 days.

Last update: 28/12/2025 23:36