Martian Calendar System
------------------------

668 sol's in a year.

Year should be divided into 4 Quarters, each of 167 days each. The 4 
Quarters are the same as the 4 Quarters of earth, useful for accounting 
and other purposes, and are the for the 4 seasons, Summer, Autumn, Winter, 
and Spring.

Names could be chosen for these 4 Quarters, and should perhaps not 
neccesarily be the name of the 4 seasons, as mars has a non-circular orbit 
causing its seasons to vary in length.

A Quarter should then be subdivided into 5 parts, called months. 4 
Quarters, of 5 months each = 20 months in a year. Other good values are 
16months, 22, 23, 24 months in a year.

At 20 months in a year, the number of days in each month is 33.4. This 
results in 3 months having 33 days, and the following 2 months have 34 
days. (For the record, the 16,22,23,24 month systems all have this problem 
too. Its impossible to subdivide the martian year such that every month 
has an equal number of days).

During a leap year, and extra day is present, on the last day of the year, 
in this case, the 35th day of the 20th month (Zeus).

A leap year occurs on odd number years, and on decimal years. Even years 
are common (non-leap) years.

Example:
2000 - leap
2001 - leap
2002 - common
2003 - leap
2004 - common
2005 - leap
2006 - common
2007 - leap
2008 - common
2009 - leap
2010 - leap

It should be noted, however, 2000 was picked as a familiar year since that 
is what it currently is on Earth. Mars will start at the year 0001.

The names of the 20 months should come from Greek Mythology, and are:

1st month:  Eos
2nd month:  Hermes
3rd month:  Eros
4th month:  Aphrodite
5th month:  Apollo
6th month:  Athena
7th month:  Poseidon
8th month:  Helius
9th month:  Demeter
10th month: Persephone
11th month: Artemis
12th month: Gaea
13th month: Selene
14th month: Theia
15th month: Borea
16th month: Hestia
17th month: Hephaestus
18th month: Asclepius
19th month: Hera
20th month: Zeus

Yes, of course i misspelt some. Email me and flame me the corrections ;)

That list comes from the "Martian Time Web Site" which has many different 
systems, of which this one is the best.


The week length, should perhaps still remain 7, though i am in favour of 
6, 8, or 10. But 7 is what we're used to most, and should perhaps just 
stick to it.

The days of the week.. well.. there are 100s of good suggestions on that 
website, and i cannot decide. Perhaps we need a voting system or 
something? ;)

Epoch
------

Though there has been much debate, i personally believe the Martian epoch 
should begin on the day of the first Human Colonization. The day humans 
land, and step onto the surface, would be 01-01-0001, or the First day of 
Eos, 0001.

There has been some push that the epoch should behind when humans first 
land (which nasa intends to do in 2020) but NOT start a colony. This, i 
feel, is wrong. Since they do not live there permanently, it is not for 
them to decide for this to be the Martian epoch.

There has also been a push for the epoch to begin on the day of the Viking 
1 Landing. Though why, i do not know. I suppose it gives the US the 
fuzzies, cuz a pile of scrap metal landed there that they had sent, and 
that should be the beggining of the Martian Calendar. Except for one 
problem. Russia beat them to it, and got stuff there first, and Russia 
isn't making any retarted claims such as the US is.

The other push, is, to start the martian clock NOW. But what day to use as 
the epoch, is again, rather arbitraliry. There are those stupid americans, 
who believe it should be on the Viking 1 landing. Others say on Eqoinox of 
the new Terran Millenium. Others yet, say other things. (more research 
needed here).

However, i make my stand. The epoch should begin on the first day of 
permanent human colonization, whenever that may be. I know the americans 
don't want this system, cuz they know they aren't going to be first. And 
since that day will become the first, dates before it won't be 
registered, so everything the US had done before that point might (and 
hoepfully WILL) be largely forgotten.

Events
-------

Date of First Human Landing
Date of First Human Colonization (may be same as above)
Date of Decleration of Mars' Inderpendance

other common Events

Xmas day? 25th of Zeus? Xmas occures less frequently on Mars


Birthdays
----------

Terrans (earthborn humans) that live on Mars, or anywhere else for that 
fact! should continue to celebrate their birthday by the standard Terran 
Calendar. So a birthday every 365.25 days.

Martians (marsborn humans) should celebrate their birthday by the standard 
Martian Calendar, so a birthday every 668 martian days.

Clearly it can be seen that the age of legalized alcohol consumption would 
have to be 10 on mars ;). A 10 year old drinking, god forbid! lol!

(If your slow, ~10 year old martian = ~18 year old terran)