Dragon Ball Time Setting

[Dayspring]

Uh, are we talking about dropping the AD calender system completely, or just changing its name? Even if you change its name to be 'PC', that doesn't change what the date revolves around, and replacing the whole calender would affect a bit more than just North America.

I meant BCE and CE instead of just BC and AD, as AD refers, incorrectly, to the Christian Calendar, whereas CE refers to the common era (which is why non-Christians use it, as well).

[Bussani]

I see. I have to say, I find it amusing that it's automatically less offensive to non-Christians when you simply change its name. The significance of the date is exactly the same. I guess it's like how Christmas would be less offensive if we called it X-mas.

[Chuquita]

Where does the "X" in X-mas come from though?

I guess I'm going to have to google this one, I'm now genuinely curious about how they get X from a word that does not have an x in it.

EDIT: Turns out it's a Greek alphabet thing. The X stood for Chi and, though having multiple meanings, could stand for an abbreviation of Christ.

I have learned something today. :3

Also:

Goku's born (Age 737): 1972 A.D.

This makes the majority of the cast significantly older than me.
Especially considering he's one of the younger characters.

[Shiyonasan]

Where does the "X" in X-mas come from though?

Not sure, but on the Wikipedia article, (I know, I know, you can't always trust Wikipedia), it says one place it could have come from is this:



It's called a Labarum, or Chi-Rho for short. Apparently, it's a Christian symbol representing Christ in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox churches.

I'm not sure if that's correct, but it seems accurate.

[Chuquita]

Wikipedia's where I went too. I have to wonder, if they were to have used XP-mas instead of X-mas, would Windows have called its older Operating System something else instead of XP, as it's kind of awkward--though I don't think Windows knew this when naming the OS.

The word "Christ" and its compounds, including "Christmas", have been abbreviated in English for at least the past 1,000 years, long before the modern "Xmas" was commonly used. "Christ" was often written as "XP" or "Xt"; there are references in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as far back as AD 1021.

I've never really looked into the Greek Alphabet, though I have looked into Latin recently as I like learning about languages (and was interested to see vegetable in Latin is vegetus.)

I'm going all off-topic, sorry about that. ^^;

[Shiyonasan]

Actually, this seems more accurate:

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Where_does_th ... _come_from

The greek letter 'x' is the first letter for the greek word for Christ, Xristos.

Xmas therefore means "Christ's Mass"

The abbreviation has been around since the 16th century.

But yeah, back on topic.....

[Chuquita]

Actually, this seems more accurate:

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Where_does_th ... _come_from

The greek letter 'x' is the first letter for the greek word for Christ, Xristos.

Xmas therefore means "Christ's Mass"

The abbreviation has been around since the 16th century.

Ah! Neat. :3

It's interesting how language evolves. It would even be possible that hundreds of years from now people would have difficulty reading the things posted here with ease the way it feels a bit stilted for some to read works like Beowulf and Shakespeare.

[Dayspring]

I see. I have to say, I find it amusing that it's automatically less offensive to non-Christians when you simply change its name. The significance of the date is exactly the same. I guess it's like how Christmas would be less offensive if we called it X-mas.

What? The third month of next year is March, 2010, not "Nissan, 2010" or "March, 2056." It's about taking the most commonly used monthly (Julian) and yearly (Anno Domini) calendars to create a standardized calendar (EDIT: or more specifically, acknowledging the Gregorian Calendar as being the standard calendar for already doing so). It has nothing to do with being offensive to non-Christians.

And X-mas is derived from two things: the Greek alternate spelling of Christ (Xristos) and the idea of X as a variable. So X-mas is short for Christmas, while also implying "generic holiday festivity," so as to encompass the Winter Solstice, Christmas, Hannucha, Kwanzaa, and the other holidays I can never remember that all take place in mid-to-late December.

On-topic: how does Dr Slump have December in its calendar while DB has "M" in its calendar? Was a complete calendar of either ever given at one point?

[Super Sonic]

On-topic: how does Dr Slump have December in its calendar while DB has "M" in its calendar? Was a complete calendar of either ever given at one point?

Sometimes and not sometimes. Dr. Slump went all over the year at times with its stories, and sometimes mentioned nonsense months. Though it did have at least 3 Christmas chapters.

[Bussani]

I see. I have to say, I find it amusing that it's automatically less offensive to non-Christians when you simply change its name. The significance of the date is exactly the same. I guess it's like how Christmas would be less offensive if we called it X-mas.

What? The third month of next year is March, 2010, not "Nissan, 2010" or "March, 2056." It's about taking the most commonly used monthly (Julian) and yearly (Anno Domini) calendars to create a standardized calendar (EDIT: or more specifically, acknowledging the Gregorian Calendar as being the standard calendar for already doing so). It has nothing to do with being offensive to non-Christians.

Huh? I'm not talking about months or other calendars, I'm talking purely about the difference between AD and CE. Whichever you use, next year is still 2010 according to them. Is there any reason to use CE other than being more universal for non-Christians?

[Piccolo Daimao]

While I understand that Dragon Ball could be percieved as being in an ancient time

Have you actually watched Dragonball?, it's rife with capsules, flying cars, submarines and giant airships.

Yeah, I kinda ignored that. I was thinking of what we see in the Tenka'ichi Budokais with the martial arts techniques and such, not the flying cars and capsules. It's not ancient.

[Herms]

On-topic: how does Dr Slump have December in its calendar while DB has "M" in its calendar? Was a complete calendar of either ever given at one point?

"M" was replaced with "May" for the Kanzenban release.

Is there any reason to use CE other than being more universal for non-Christians?

Well for one thing, according to modern scholarship Jesus was almost certainly born a few years before 1 A.D., and it seems rather silly to me to use a calendar system where Christ is born several years before Christ.

[Bussani]

Well for one thing, according to modern scholarship Jesus was almost certainly born a few years before 1 A.D., and it seems rather silly to me to use a calendar system where Christ is born several years before Christ.

Okay, that one makes sense.

[Dayspring]

Well for one thing, according to modern scholarship Jesus was almost certainly born a few years before 1 A.D., and it seems rather silly to me to use a calendar system where Christ is born several years before Christ.

Okay, that one makes sense.

That and I think you misunderstood me: the Gregorian Calendar is NOT the Anno Domini calendar. It uses the A.D. calendar for its yearly calendar (Anno Domini was practically just about removing the need to create a new yearly calendar base every time a king/ruler died). C.E. is about calling the Gregorian Calendar the standard commonly used calendar in a way that doesn't dwell on everything being based on innacurate Christ info.

[Godo]

While I understand that Dragon Ball could be percieved as being in an ancient time

Have you actually watched Dragonball?, it's rife with capsules, flying cars, submarines and giant airships.

And the events in Star Wars are occurring a "long time ago". And still they have flying cars, giant airships and even lightsabres.

[MCDaveG]

Hmm...if Dragon Ball takes place at first in 1984, then that makes Gohan as old as me

Gohan premiered in the manga in 1988, though....

Yeah amazing year, I was born and the Sonic Boom from Omega II as well
Damn, I'm feeling too old

[ShadowDude112]

Are you sure you're not just thinking about this to hard? I mean seriously it's a manga made by a guy that likes poop jokes which I have no problem with I think they're funny. Just don't think about it so hard, simple as that.

[MCDaveG]

On-topic: how does Dr Slump have December in its calendar while DB has "M" in its calendar? Was a complete calendar of either ever given at one point?

"M" was replaced with "May" for the Kanzenban release.

Is there any reason to use CE other than being more universal for non-Christians?

Well for one thing, according to modern scholarship Jesus was almost certainly born a few years before 1 A.D., and it seems rather silly to me to use a calendar system where Christ is born several years before Christ.

Also, if you read Däniken, Christ probably didn't die as it's claimed but went to east in nowadays India, where the Jewish division of Ephrahim was located in Kashmir and there he died long ago......
It's claimed that his grave is here, but it's not studied yet.
Crucifiction wasn't death penalty in Roman Empire as lot of people thinks, but only an punishment and almost every young human survived it.....

And yes, gregorian calendar made a mistake and Christ was probably born cca 4 years before the begining of calendar...... If he existed. Nobody knows))))

[Bussani]

That and I think you misunderstood me: the Gregorian Calendar is NOT the Anno Domini calendar.

...Yeah, thanks, I know. I must have worded something oddly for you to think I was talking about something else, but I'm kind of insulted that you think you need to explain this to me.

It uses the A.D. calendar for its yearly calendar (Anno Domini was practically just about removing the need to create a new yearly calendar base every time a king/ruler died). C.E. is about calling the Gregorian Calendar the standard commonly used calendar in a way that doesn't dwell on everything being based on innacurate Christ info.

Which is what Herms said, unless I'm missing something.

[Piccolo Daimao]

As Dayspring said, according to Daizenshuu 7 both the Age and Western calendar system are used on DB Earth. The Age system is the most common, but certain places like Penguin Village use the Western calendar. This comes from the fact that Dr. Slump referenced the real-world Western year a few times, and the passage of time in the series overall matched the passage of real-world time. Daizenshuu 7 doesn't give any way to convert between the two calendars, but it does give birth/creation Age years for the various Dr. Slump characters, so it seem that Age 745 is equivalent to 1980 A.D. Using that we get the following:

Goku's born (Age 737): 1972 A.D.
Beginning of series (Age 749): 1984 A.D.
21st TB, RR (Age 750): 1985 A.D.
22nd TB, Daimao (Age 753): 1988 A.D.
23rd TB (Age 756): 1991 A.D.
Freeza arc (Age 762): 1997 A.D.
Cell arc (Age 767): 2002 A.D.
Boo arc (Age 774): 2009 A.D.
28th TB (Age 784): 2019 A.D.
GT (Age 789): 2024 A.D.

This would also make 0 A.D. be in Pre-Age 1235.
edit: Darn, I forgot there is no year 0. So Pre-Age 1235 would be 1 B.C., and 1234 would be 1 A.D.

Don't you mean 1234 A.D. or whatever would be Age 1?

On a random note, Age 1000 would be 2235 A.D. in the Western calendar.