While this part of the calendar was based on scientific principles, other parts of it were based on custom, as well as the decisions of authorities, religious and secular. Each year was divided into 12 months of varying lengths, from 28 (or 29 in a leap year) to 31 days each, and 52 weeks of 7 days each. Each day was divided into 24 hours, each hour containing 60 minutes, and each minute 60 seconds.
In terms of the reckoning of the civil time during the day, an international conference in 1884 AD decided that the Earth would be divided into zones of 15?, time in each zone being reckoned in hours west or east of the prime meridian (O? longitude), which passed through Greenwich, London, United Kingdom. The time at the prime meridian was called Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), later Universal Time (UT).
There were a couple of references to the Federation reckoning time by a New Calendar. In Pressure Point, Blake told Gan that the Federation had all churches destroyed at 'the beginning of the New Calendar'; and Avon said in Countdown that Albian was colonised in 'the last century of the Old Calendar'.
It is possible that the 'Old Calendar' was the Gregorian one, and that the 'New Calendar' was introduced for anti-religious reasons, presumably changing the counting of the years from the birth of Jesus Christ. Something similar happened on Earth in 1792-1806 with the French Revolutionary Calendar, the year 1792 being changed to Year One.
No information was given on whether there was an attempt by the Federation to make months more uniform, or change the number of days in the week, or rename the months or the days of the week. The number of hours, minutes and seconds in the day appeared to have been unchanged. While there were no references regarding any century in the New Calendar, there were 27 references to years, 26 in The Way Back, 1 in Traitor:
In The Way Back, first were the years seen in the medical records of the 3 children Blake was alleged to have committed the offences against:
| Renor Leesal: | 42,42,42,43,45,46,49. |
| Carl Deca: | 43,43,48,48. |
| Payter Fen: | 43,43,44,46,47,48,49. |
| In terms of their school attendance records: | |
| Renor Leesal: | 48,49,51,52. |
| Payter Fen: | 52. |
There were 21 full New Calendar references, in terms of the year, month, and date, given in The Way Back. First were the school attendance records for the 3 children:
| Lesal Renor: | 42.1.5 42.4.3 42.10.6 43.5.3 45.1.5 46.5.3 49.3.7 |
| Carl Deca: | 43.6.2 43.10.11 48.4.3 48.8.8 |
| Payter Fen: | 43.2.1 43.8.4 44.5.3 46.7.3 47.6.8 48.4.4 49.7.5 |
As mentioned before, there were 3 references to the date of their unrecorded admission to the Central Clinic: 52.6.8.
While it would therefore appear that, in official references to the New Calendar, the years of the century were given first, whether the full reference was: year. date. month, or year. month. date, cannot be deduced from the evidence available; so the 3 children were either admitted to the Central Clinic on 8th June or 6th August of '52.
Presumably, this New Calendar was the civil calendar on Earth and throughout the Federation, though presumably co-existing with local calendars on non-Earth planets. The seconds, minutes, and hours used might have been the original Earth ones, common to all the calendars; the days, weeks, months, and years used in the local calendars would be different. This appears to have been the case according to a remark by Blake in Time Squad about the planet Saurian Major, 'One of the early self-governing colonies subsequently annexed by the Federation', that it had a 'day' of 'about thirty six hours', presumably meaning a standard hour derived from the Earth one.
There were 6 references in Assassin to a date, 'the ninth', contained in a message from Servalan to Cancer, related to the planet Domo. Her message to Cancer, played back 3 times, contained the words, 'Domo the ninth'. Tarrant repeated the words once as a question, and Dayna then mentioned 'the ninth' twice, speculating that it was a date, something accepted by the rest of the crew.
There were 38 references, either to a 24-hour clock, to a time scale called 'Federation Standard Time', 'Earth Standard Time', 'Earth Time', or 'Standard Time', or both:
These were probably references to a Federation Standard Time (FST) that may have been the successor to Earth's Universal Time, formerly Greenwich Mean Time. This was possibly used as the standard civil time by the Federation, possibly on Earth and in Federation space, people living in domed cities and in space not noticing any difference between clock time and the position of Earth's sun.
Presumably due to Earth being the capital planet of the Federation, and for other reasons, perhaps a desire to refer to one's Earth origins, anti-Federation reasons, and others, FST was also referred to as 'Earth Standard Time' or 'Earth Time', both inside and outside of the Federation. Also used, according to the mutoid in Hostage or Vila in Power, was the abbreviation of 'Standard' or 'Standard Time'.
In Power there were two references to what might have been a form of clock time used on Xenon:
When Nina gave the Seskan report on the last engagement on the Battle for A-X Ridge, she mentioned defence losses at the time of 'oh eight five three nine'.
Nina later said that a nucleic burster was released at 'oh eight six one one'.
The following references to time measurements also include those made in a colloquial context.
There were 112 references to seconds: Details.
There were 242 references to minutes: Details.
There were 200 references to this unit: Details.
There were 70 references to this unit: Details.
There were 19 references to this unit: Details.
There were 21 references to this unit: Details.
There were 168 references to this unit: Details.
This unit was mentioned 5 times:
| Episode | Reference |
|---|---|
| Horizon | the Kommissar said, ordering Blake and Jenna to be put to work, 'They'll be begging to help us before three time units are up'. |
| Selma told Jenna that she would die from radioactivity in 'thirty time units'. | |
| Blake told Vila that he had 'thirty time units', as the stuff he was carrying was radioactive. | |
| Hostage | Travis told Blake to come to Exbar within 'twenty five time units' or Inga would die. |
| Gold | Keiller told the passengers that that was the end of the itinerary 'for the standard unit number six'. |
In Orac, a flight log entry, numbered 431, had a 'time co-ordinate six six two'.
In Mission to Destiny, Rafford, the pilot of the Ortega, in making his log entry, said, 'Flight time zero one zero, elapsed nine zero'.
There were 2 references to a date code: In Trial, Travis was accused of the murder of 1417 unarmed civilians at 'Date Code Beta two zero zero one'.
In Volcano, Zen said that a Federation report, one zero sub five was dated 'date code three zero three', said by Vila to be 'a long time ago'.