Numerical Year

[maladaar]

Besides being referenced as the Year of the Gazelle and so forth, has there ever been a reference to a numerical year?

Example: What numerical year did Conan become king?

 

[kintire]

The Hyborian age, like most of history, operates in regnal years. There is no single date system.

 

[decker423]

You would think that the Nemedians would come up with something. They came up with the "Nemedian Chronicles" which seems to be a collection of all things historical. If they are big into history and other academics, wouldn't they try to come up with a classification system for their dates and years?

 

[Kortoso]

They didn't.

This is similar (or we may assume identical) to the Chinese system, where the hours as well as the months are named after a series of animals.

From the tales we have only Dragon and Gazelle.

 

[kintire]

You would think that the Nemedians would come up with something. They came up with the "Nemedian Chronicles" which seems to be a collection of all things historical. If they are big into history and other academics, wouldn't they try to come up with a classification system for their dates and years?

They may be responsible for these years of the gazelle and such. But not necessarily. The historical Chinese were also heavily into history, and they did fine with Imperial regnal years. with only a few hiccups...

 

[Kortoso]

Then Conan would have become king in year 0. Hardly makes for vivid storytelling.

And what of poor Pelias? "It is the month of Yuluk in the fifteenth year of me."

Indeed regnal years were common many cultures, and sometimes the monarch switched up the system to change their luck (at least I know that was done by Japanese emperors). All kinds of interesting possibilities. But REH offered an animal-based zodiac-like system, did he not?

Kintire, do you know of an example of a regnal year system in the canon stories?

 

[decker423]

What about the Stygians? In real life the ancient Egyptians built a calendar that revolved around the River Nile and the seasons of flooding, planting crops, harvesting crops. Given their knowledge of astronomy as well, do you think they might have some system in place as well? What about Khitai or Vendhya or Zamora?

I"m not saying they did or didn't but you would think that extensive arcane/astronomical/cosmological knowledge with extensive histories would result in some sort of classification for time.

I understand and accept that peasants and farmers and those not concerned with academics would stick to the traditional "seasonal" cycles of time (Winter-Spring-Summer-Fall, Solstice, Equinox, etc.) but what about those who are concerned with "higher" topics.

My 2 cents.

 

[Kortoso]

Cool, Decker, go for it! Check out what the ancient Egyptians had for inspiration. I would even look at the Coptics and Berbers to see whether they had an interesting system to raid. It's wide open.