The current calendar used throughout most of Harkovast is the Lel Calender.
The Lel love the organisation and accumulation of knowledge above all things, and this naturally led them to want to create a system for measuring the passage of time.
Their system caught on in Xalkara and then spread out through the less of Harkovast.
Harkovast years are roughly 365 days in length.
Under the Lel system, the year is divided into 10 months, with the first 5 months being 36 days in length, the second 5 being 37 days long.
So the Calendar looks like this-


First (36 days)
Second (36 days)
Third (36 days)
Forth (36 days)
Fifth (36 days)
Sixth (37 days)
Seventh (37 days)
Eighth (37 days)
Ninth (37 days)
Tenth (37 days)

The years are measured from year zero, when the calendar was founded.
Years prior to this are counted backwards and are referred to as “Pre-Lel” and years after this are referred to as “Lel-reckoning” and are counted forwards.

So a typical date might be “The 32nd of the Forth, 313 Lel-Reckonning”
This would mean the 32nd day of the forth month of the 313th year since Lel reckoning began.

The White Kingdom has its own calendar based on the dynasties of various Emperors, but I will lay that out another time.

I like this. So often you'll find people writing about some other world that uses the Gregorian calendar for some bizarre reason.

Renard
I like this. So often you'll find people writing about some other world that uses the Gregorian calendar for some bizarre reason.

I agree, this is a nice touch. Would pre-lel, and lel-reckoning be shortened too, PL, and LR?
The more I hear the Lel mentioned the more i want to know about them.

Renard, yeah it just struck me that Harkovast needed its own way to track the passage of dates.
I dont know how much it will come up in the story, but like the money systems, it is good to know.

Tiberius yes, that is a reasonable abbreviation.
Most people in Harkovast use the calender without really knowing what a Lel is or where the system comes from.
The Lel themselves refer to it as “Before Dating” and “After Dating”, since they made it they dont specify Lel in the title. Also to them, the term pre-Lel sounds silly. There were Lel before they invented calendars!