>I believe that the the Orlanthi barbarians are so scientifically
>primitive, they have no conception of time other than as the movement of
>the sun across the sky. Consequently, the start of regular movement of
>the sun across the heavens is to them the start of time.
I think the Orlanthi have another concept of time. That of generations usually named after important people. So you have Sartar's time, Vingkot's time etc. right back to Orlanth and Ernalda's time. Precisely what year any of the events happened no one knows and few care. Clearly Orlanth courted Ernalda before he married her and after that she bore his children. That's just the way things are done.
The scholars of Lhankor Mhy have tried to fix dates to all the events since the sun started moving across the sky by reference to other calendars and histories but there just isn't enough to go on for earlier events. The typical Orlanthi doesn't bother with the scholar's numbering system.
>More
>sophisticated peoples, such as the Dara Happans and (especially) the
>Brithini, know this for the nonsense it is, and can give precise dates
>for events before 0 ST. Faced with the sun stopping in the sky, the
>Orlanthi would consider that as "time stopping".
I doubt that. They call it the Sunstop not the Timestop. The typical Orlanthi will have wondered why the sun was in the same place although he'd managed to plow half a dozen furrows. Or that he and his oxen needed rest and food and the sun was in the wrong place.
The estimate of how long the sun stopped for will have ben done by scholars who had access to some other form of measurement - e.g. water clocks.
-- Donald Oddy http://www.grove.demon.co.uk/
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