The Kingdom’s planetary days and years are:

The clocks of each planet count time in full 60-minute standard hours with an additional, shorter “hour” called “compensate” (or, more commonly, simply “comp”) to make up the difference. Thus, the planet Manticore’s day consists of 22 standard hours hours plus a 27-minute-long comp, while Sphinx’s day consists of 25 hours plus a 37-minute comp. Gryphon’s day, like Manticore’s, is 22 T-hours long, but with a comp of approximately 42.5 minutes.

The planetary week is seven planetary days long in each case, and Manticore’s day is used aboard all Royal Navy vessels.

The official year of the Kingdom is 673 days long, with a leap year every third year. It is divided into 18 months, 11 of 37 days and 7 of 38, alternating for the first 6 and last 8 months, named (simply, if rather unimaginatively) First Month, Second Month, Third Month, etc. The Gryphon local year is also divided into 18 months (16 of 36 days and 2 of 37 days) with the extra days in Ninth and Tenth and one extra day in Eleventh Month every other local year. The Sphinxian year, however, is divided into 46 months, 35 of 39 days and 11 of 38 days (the shorter months fall in even-numbered months from Twelfth to Thirty-Second), with a leap year every 7 years. All of these calendars are reckoned in “Years After Landing” (abbreviated A.L.), dating from the day (March 21, 1416 P.D.) the first shuttle from the colony ship Jason touched down on the present-day site of the city of Landing. Obviously, this means that each planet’s local year is a different “Year After Landing” from any of the others. Thus, Honor Harrington’s orders to Fearless, dated Fourth 25, 280 A.L. (using Official Manticoran Reckoning, or the Manticore planetary calendar), were also written on March 3, 1900 P.D. (Standard Reckoning), and on Second 26, 93 A.L. (using the local Sphinxian calendar). This plethora of dates is a major reason Manticorans tend to convert time spans into T-years for comparison purposes.

DAVID WEBER (USA, 1952) is a science fiction and fantasy writer born in Cleveland, Ohio. Previously he owned a small advertising and public relation agency, but now writes fiction full time. The author of sixty-three works of fiction since 1990. His work ranges from epic fantasy to alternate history to space opera and military science fiction. He is a New York Times bestseller, the winner of the Phoenix Award, and has been nominated for Locus Awards.

He and his wife Sharon live in Greenvile, South Carolina with their three children and dogs. He is a Methodist lay preacher, which has caused him to explore how religion can be a force for good but also how it can be misused for evil. An avid fan of history who dreamt of being a history professor, his fiction has been greatly influenced by his interest in history, with a strong emphasis on military history and diplomacy.