Trade Standard Dating

The Trade Standard Dating system was developed by the Mirrandian Trader's Guild as a tool to aid in dating contracts and shipments. As their influence grew across the continent, it became the world's de facto calendar. Other systems still exist, but are used infrequently by isolated communities such as the rakshasans or within the underdark.

Basic structure of the year:

• Each year is divided into sets of months called Seasons with a universally recognized holiday between them.
• Each Seasons is further divided into three months
• Each month is divided into three ten-days which are the smallest multi-day units of time used. These ten-days are also called weeks.

Naming Conventions:

• Each Season is named after the time of year they cover, namely Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter.
• Each month is named after then classical alchemical metals of Copper, Silver, and Gold. These names are shared between each Season but are rarely referenced independently. Normal usage would be Month-Season, e.g. Siler Earth or Golden Fire.
• Weeks and Days are not named but are listed as numbers from 1 to 30. Individual days are, generally, referenced with their month and Season but not always; if a number is given, it's assumed to be part of the current month.
• Examples of days:
  • 20th Copper Spring
  • 1st Golden Summer
  • 18th Silver Fall

Holidays:

• There are five holidays in a standard trade year.
• There is one holiday between each of the Seasons and an additional holiday at the start of each year.
• Each of the holidays are on the corresponding equinox or solstice
• There is an extra holiday at the start of the year, leading to two consecutive holidays.
• The names of the holidays, and their reasoning, is as follows:
  • Deepdawn/Dawn of Rebirth - Start of the new year, Starts at midnight of the Winter Solstice
  • Midspring - Vernal Equinox
  • Highmorning/All-Sun's-Day - Summer Solstice
  • Midfall - Autumnal Equinox
  • Deepnight/Night of Mourning - Starts at the dawn before the Winter Solstice
• The new year was chosen to coincide with the Elven traditions of Mourning Night and the Dawn of Rebirth which was the 48 hour period in which the entire populace grieves for the losses that their race endured in the previous year. It was believed that on the Dawn of Rebirth, all of the lost souls would find their way into new bodies This is now believed to be apocryphal and the spike in birth rates sixteen months after each Dawn of Rebirth is simply due to the celebratory nature of the time. To date, no natural reincarnation theory has been proven.

Calendar Iconography

Below is the base symbology for the Trade Standard Calendar. Each Month is represented as a vertical line, each Season is a group of three vertical lines, and each holiday is represented as a horizontal line.

In use, the full calendar does not need to be displayed, only the relevant information. The conventional form this takes is to draw the calendar from Right to Left, stopping on the current month. The most recently passed holiday is always drawn and the current day is written above it. See the example below for the 22nd Golden Fall:

Mirr