Canopican Calendar

The Canopican Year lasts 300 24-hour days, divided up into three seasons of 100 days each: Peret (planting), Shemu (harvest), and Akhet (flood, when the Great River overflows its banks and enriches the arable land of the riverbanks). Feast days for the six gods of the Canopican pantheon are evenly dispersed throughout the year, with one on the first day of each season and one on the fiftieth day of each season.

The 24-hour Canopican day is defined by the cycles of the sun. The sun always is positioned at the zenith of the sky, and for ten hours of each twenty-four hour cycle, it fades to a dusty red and appears to the naked eye to shrink to about 50% of its daytime size.

The crescent moon hovers just above the horizon, visible from the middle of the world but often obscured from view if you are located by the mountains bordering the world’s edge. The year is defined by the moon’s 300-day circuit around the horizon of Canopica. In both the Upper and Lower Kingdoms, any village square will have a moondial, a circular stone base inscribed with a calendar diagram (see picture above), topped by a bronze wand infused with divination magic that allows it to follow the moon’s path. The Feast of Osiris, falling on the first day of Peret, is River Moon, the day when the moon aligns with the mouth of the Great River.