Star Wars - Shrike Naasade (The Goblin) - Star Wars, Dates, and Timekeeping

The intention of this document is to help prequel-era writers understand the ordering and dates of events, especially during the Clone Wars, and how to use in-universe timekeeping in the planning or body of your story. It also provides a chronology of the war and useful references.Even if you’re not a prequel-era writer, or even a writer at all, this may help you make sense of the dumpster fire that is timekeeping in the galaxy far, far away.

1. Understanding Timekeeping

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is dedicated to Meggory and ACatByAnyOtherName > Ask and you shall receive.

Everything in this document pertains entirely to the EU and _absolutely nothing to do with anything Disney_.

Section 1: An Overview of Timekeeping Section 2: Branch Aurek (2003) of the Clone Wars timeline Section 3: Branch Besh (2008) of the Clone Wars timeline Section 4: Useful Resources Section 5: Notes and Errata Section 6: Works Cited Section 7: Bibliography

### Understanding the Difference Between a _Calendar System_ and a _Relative Dating System_

A relative dating system measures time’s passage in reference to a specific event.

A calendar is a system by which the beginning, length, and subdivisions of the year are fixed.[1]

BBY/ABY was used in our universe as a _relative dating system_. It measured time’s passage in reference to the Battle of Yavin.[2] It was used by the holocron, a database maintained by Lucasfilm to track the IP. It was never meant to be used as a calendar.[3]

Despite the fact there was an existing in-universe calendar as early as 1996, the BBY system was more well-known, and became so prolific that it was eventually adopted as canon.[4] This wasn’t so much of an issue until the Clone Wars rolled around. For the first time there were densely-packed events whose ordering mattered immensely to the narrative. More precisely, “21 BBY” isn’t a date.

Enter the Great ReSynchronization (GrS) system, a bonafide calendar. It was used in-universe as such by the Republic and the Empire[5]. These “primary sources” gave hard dates, such as 16:5:24 for the fall of the Republic.[6]  The issue became reconciling “primary historical resources” with “contemporary sources”. ( _The Essential Chronology_  and  _New Essential Chronology_  are both reports from an in-universe perspective).[7][8] “Contemporary” sources used a relative dating system while “historical” sources used a calendar.

The Battle of Yavin occurred on 35:3:7[9].  Understand that ABY/BBY denotes how much time had passed in reference to that date.

### Understanding the GrS Calendar

#### What We Know: Days, Months, and Years

* The GrS formats dates in this way: [year:month:day]. * Days in a year: 368. This seems to be the only agreed-upon number. * Months in a year: not officially set. Some sources use 10, some use 12. * Weeks in a month: not set. * Days in a month: not set. (See "Section 4: Useful References")