Happy Birthday!

[Marauder Moe]

So, do people in Zalanthas (or the more civilized areas at least) celibrate birthdays?  I know its hard to catch your character's birthday but it might be fun to mention it to others and maybe enjoy a free drink or two.

[Dakkon Black]

I dont see why not, If anything the average Zalanthian would be more than over eager to get his shard of free drinks. Hell have your birthday once a month!  

[Fedaykin]

The average commoner has no real way to keep track of the exact date due to the lack of writing and caldendars, aside from knowing what day of the week it is.  They would probably just have more of a general idea of when their birthday is rather than knowing the exact.

Therefore, I don't think birthdays would be very celibrated, unless in certain places or tribes they had some sort of coming of age thing, in which case such an occasion might be celebrated, but even then perhaps not on the exact date.

[Marauder Moe]

Yeah, thats what I figured.  Keeping track of the exact date would be difficult for the average commoner.  Perhaps wealthier merchants and nobles might have calendars though?

[My 2 sids]

Wait... so now they dont have math and calenders?  Maybe Im still an "earthling" but a lot of illiterate cultures had very complex accounting and calenders that people used.

Further I would think (perhaps like in earily england where it only counted after say five or so many babies died) birthdays would be celebrated greatly.  I mean... your alive!

[Fedaykin]

While there once was the old Great Sun Observatory, I don't recall ever seeing any sort of calendar type item in game, and if so, certainly not in the hands of a commoner.  Soon as I see commoners carrying around pocket calendars, I'll change my stance

The ability to do some simple arithmatic which most commonder use is very different from any advanced sort of math which would probably require writing.

As for a comparison to an RL illiterate culture, I don't think one would be accurate in my opinion because we are not dealing with an 'illiterate culture' in the traditional sense.  We're dealing with cultures where a small percentage of the population is literate and forcibly prevents the rest of the population from using forms of writing as one way of cementing their rule over them.

To me at least, the idea of celebrating birthdays regularly seems more of  a westernized/earth concept and, at least for me, calls to mind images of kids running around in party hats blowing out candles. Who gets first swing on the gurth shaped pinata?  

[Morninglight]

By the same token, most commoners could be smart enough to count the weeks in a month - if only by saying 'Oh, it's been a hand of weeks since the Low Sun started.'

They may not know the exact day, but possibly the week and certainly the month of the year they were born in.

Just my two 'sids,

[My 2 sids]

Ok... maybe Zen is different but I do feel the need to make sure people understand a few things about -earth- history.

One.  Writting has been around LONG before it was legal and normal for the common person to know.

Two.  Calenders have been around LONG LONG before written words.  Calenders take mathmatical cauclations, but it wasent always that complicated.  

Three.  Almost every culture and society has had some kind of celebration of birth.  Because BIRTH is VERY important to the continuation of life.  Birth and Birthing have LONG been part of every culture's celebrations.


Thus, I stick by what I said.   The people do have birthdays and probably celebrates them.  Maybe not with getting gifts and cake.... maybe they bring the gifts to their parents?  or... take a bath... or I dont know... but in a world with so much death, no one can tell me they dont keep track of birth and age.  (BTW age is already put into place in the game.... like one has to be an age to belong to the Byn... so they have to have some kind of recording of the years.)

[crymerci]

There's a couple possible ways people could fairly easily keep track of dates.

1) Counting the weeks of the month: i.e. "tenth Ocandra of Low Sun."

2) Town criers might go about shouting the day and time once or twice a day.

[Impska]

As mentioned: Town criers.

Also, your local daily religious observation would likely include some reference. The various temples might know, as well.

[Shinigami]

Short of the fearful worship of Tektolnes, there is no "religion" in Allanak, the temples are places for foul magickers to congregate and have no religious significance.

-Shinigami, Apostate Tektonalian

[DrunkenSalarr]

Short of the fearful worship of Tektolnes, there is no "religion" in Allanak, the temples are places for foul magickers to congregate and have no religious significance.

I thought Impska was refering to the two temples for Tektolnes, not the magicker templars.  I see no reason why the White-robe that you get your water from might not be able to tell you what day it is.

Speaking of White-Robes, why is a Blue leading Morning Devotions and not a White, as that particular kind of thing was the whole reason (as was given in the history file) their order was created.

And, as I see it, common people should be able to get a rough idea of what day it is by the positions of the moons (as this is the whole basis of the calander).  If your mother told you you were born on the first night of Low Sun that the White Moon was directly overhead and the red moon was nowhere to be seen, you should be able to know that's your birthday.

Culture is pretty funny, the less advanced they are, the more they tend to pay attention to astronomical signs (at least the position of the moon(s) at important times).  And a culture, such as the Zalanthan cultures, whos entire calander is based on the position of two moons, should be paying very close attention to it, the commoners more than the nobles as the nobles would have someone to do it for them.

Drunken Salarr, who doesn't see why a culture, just because they can't read and write, has to be to stupid to look up in the sky when it's clear.

[spawnloser]

I'm going to have to agree with DrunkenSalarr and Morninglight.  For example, my current character has it pretty easy...she was born just a couple days before the end of a month...granted, she isn't going to necessarily celebrate right on her birthday, but she'll celebrate at the end of the month.

[Cuusardo]

Because of my character's personal history, she doesn't know exactly how old she is, much less when her birthday is.  Ergo, birthdays are unimportant to her.

[Kauket]

While there once was the old Great Sun Observatory, I don't recall ever seeing any sort of calendar type item in game, and if so, certainly not in the hands of a commoner. Soon as I see commoners carrying around pocket calendars, I'll change my stance  

Just because something isn't coded in game doesn't make it non-existant.  I've never seen a corkscrew in Arm, for example, that doesn't mean they might not exist in abundance, or any number of other day to day objects.  I once saw a room description that described a strange creation of water balances that somehow measured time, and this was owned by a group of commoners, you might say, so anything is possible.  The way I see it, if someone (commoner or otherwise) wishes to RP knowing the exact date of their birthday, fine, and if they want to not RP knowing (due to lack of calculating abilities) that's fine too.