Calendars

Calendars
Time keeping in Oenus is generally done with the use of one of three calendars. A Solar Calendar is encouraged by followers of The Solar. Most people do not use this method instead preferring to use one of several lunar calendars due to the presence of useful subdivisions. The lunar calendars are preferred because of their useful subdivisions but do not hold dates statically relative to the seasons.

The Solar Calendar
The Solar calendar is 392 days long with a leap day every ten years. This calendar is supported by many followers of The Solar. The orbital plane of Oenus around it's sun is not significantly inclined from the terrestrial rotation axis. The orbit is highly elliptical. Seasonal variation occurs due to the changing proximity of Oenus to the Sun. This makes seasonal observation very challenging. A good reckoning of the season requires an accurate counting of the days or complex estimations of distance using the apparent size of the Sun.

The Lunar Calendars
There are two lunar calendars in use.

The Dwarven Reckoning
The Dwarven Reckoning is the simplest and most commonly used. This takes advantage of the 29 day orbital period of Orba. The year is 14 months (406 days) each starting on the new moon. Each month will process through the seasons. In most lands the the 14 months are broken into 4 seven day weeks with a holiday belonging to none of the weeks on the full moon in the middle of each month.

The Mage's Count
The Mage's Count is a calendar that is said to exist to solve a problem that doesn't exist. Seeking to reconcile the Solar year and a Lunar calendar this system uses the eclipse of Agiel and Celure, Oenus's two smaller moons, to count years. This eclipse occurs to within about an hour of exactly 1176 days, or three solar years. Agiel is more easily seen than Celure, and so it is used for the Months, of which there are seven in a year. A 168 day month is too long to be practical, and so the seven twenty-four day weeks are used as the discriminators. Thus, there are forty-nine weeks in a year.