Time and the timeline

Calendar and histories

Open Calendar and histories from the World menu (or from the Timeline). Under The world's eras, your world's history is a list of eras, each with a name and a short form, such as Age of Crowns and AC. For each era you choose how its years count:

  • Starts again at year 1 (most eras);
  • Keeps counting from the era before;
  • Counts down to the next era, like years "BC".

Give an era a length (in years) when the next one follows it. Only the first era can count down, and it has no length (its Lasts is greyed out): it reaches back from the next era as far as you need. Name your months (seasons work fine) and give each its days, or just the days in a year. To start over with Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter, open More under the months and choose Use the standard four seasons.

Dates can be as precise as you know them: a year ("212 AC"), a month ("Thaw 212 AC") or a day ("3 Thaw 212 AC", also "Thaw 3, 212 AC"). Write "c." in front of a guess ("c. 300 AC"). A day must fit in its month; without days per month, each month gets an even share of the year (30 days when the year has no number either).

Try a date checks how Canopy reads a date before you use it: it writes the date in each count and says where it falls ("Year 52 of 640 in Age of Kings, 589 years before Drowned Years"). In an era that counts down, it says how long until the era it counts down to. When Canopy can't read a date, it says why when it can: a day past the end of its month ("Thaw has 40 days."), or a month or an era your world doesn't have.

Every date box on the page (an era's Starts at, a split's When, Today in the world) takes a year, a month or a day, and says under it how Canopy reads it.

Today in the world, under The present day, is where your story stands: it gives characters their age ("Age 54 now") and the timeline its Now. The active campaign's own present day comes first.

Dating an article

Any article can have a When box. Until it has a date, a small Add line at the end of the page offers it: tap Put on the timeline (or Timeline), then:

  • Date, and Until if it lasts: the date it's over ("410 AK" to "431 AK"), or how long it lasted ("40 days", "3 years"). The When box shows how long that is. Until is the day it's over, not its last day: 40 days from 3 Thaw is over on 43 Thaw, so the When box adds last day 42 Thaw;
  • Shown as: words to show instead of the date ("Long ago");
  • Part of a longer event, or After the event it follows (for undated events, to keep their order);
  • Begins an era: this event starts one of your eras;
  • Importance: World-shaking, Major or Minor.

When an event links to people with a birth date (in its text or a field), the When box and the timeline list their Ages then ("Tavin Vey, age 1"), for everyone alive at the time. An event that links to nobody yet says so in its When box: link the people who were there to see their ages.

Born and died

A character's Life box holds when they were Born and Died, written as dates. Tap Born and died in the Add line at the end of their page (or Edit life once there are dates). The box shows their age: Age 54 now, at the present day of the active campaign (or the world's), or Died aged 70.

A person is one life. If a character also has a When that starts the year they were born, that When is their life: an Until there is when they died (marked from When in the Life box), and they show on the timeline once, not twice. A character dated only by a When (as worlds were before Born and Died) gets Make it Born and Died in their Life box, which moves those dates over.

Births and deaths show on the timeline (born, dies, aged 70). In To scale, each life is a dashed bar from birth to death, or up to Now for the living, with the name on the bar when it's long enough (zoom in for short lives); Lanes: By kind puts them in their own lane.

Founded and fell

A location's Years box holds when it was Founded and, if it fell, when it Fell and how: Ruined, Destroyed or Abandoned. Tap Founded and fell in the Add line at the end of its page (or Edit dates once there are dates). The box says how long ago: Founded 312 AK, 1,240 years ago and Ruined 912 AK, 640 years ago, at the present day of the active campaign (or the world's). Your own templates that count as places (a Temple) get it too; natural features and planes don't, since nobody founds a mountain.

An event set in a place after it fell happens in the ruins of it (at the remains of a destroyed place, in abandoned one): it says so on the event's page and on the timeline. That's not a mistake, so it's never flagged: an expedition into an ancient city is a story.

On the timeline, places show founded and ruined (or destroyed, abandoned); in To scale, a bar for the years they stood. Players get a founding or fall only once their campaign has reached it, and how it fell with it.

Dates that don't add up

Canopy gently points out dates that don't hang together, for you only:

  • a child born before a parent, or more than a year after a parent died (on both their pages). Partners aren't checked: a wife may well be younger than her husband;
  • a place that fell before it was founded, or was founded before the place it's part of (a district older than its town);
  • an event that has someone in one of its fields before they were born or after they died, or mentions them in its text within twenty years of their life (on the event's page, and check dates on the timeline). Further off, a mention is about them rather than with them, such as a prophecy or a chronicle written centuries later, and isn't flagged.

Nothing is changed: it's a note to check.

Histories

A long history gets crowded: the Elves don't care about the first dwarven king. Every world starts with one history, The world. When you need more, add a history for a people, faction or faith (The Dwarves, The Elves) under Histories on the Calendar and histories page, with Another history.

  • Counts years: Like the world keeps dates in the world's count; eras you give it only group its events on its timeline. Their own way gives it eras with short labels of their own, for dates like "12 DR". Either way, say when each of its eras starts, as a date in the world's count: a year ("150 AK"), or a month or a day when it began partway through one ("3 Highsun 150 AK"). Under the box, Canopy says how it reads it, or that it can't. An era that starts partway through a year counts that year as its year 1; the days before its first day still belong to the era before.
  • Whose history: the article for that people, faction or faith (optional): start typing and pick it from the list. That article's page gets a History tab, next to Article, with this history's events era by era and Open on the timeline. An event that links to the article gets that history suggested.
  • Each history says how many events are part of it. Removing a history keeps its events; they show under Everything until you give them another history.

A history that splits off

Histories aren't always apart from the start: the Kingdom of Vey shares the Humans' past until it breaks away in 412 AK. Tap Splits off from another history… under a history, pick the history in Splits off from, and write When, as a date in the world's count.

  • Until then it shares that history's events and eras: on its timeline (and its History tab) they show greyed, marked from The Humans. Nothing is written on those events, so moving the split moves them too. Only dated events from before the split are shared.
  • Its own eras start at the split, unless you say when the first one starts. A history that counts Their own way writes dates from before the split the way the history it came from does.
  • A history can split off from one that split off itself (the Humans, then Vey, then Low Vey). It can't split off from one that comes from it: the list doesn't offer those.
  • An event marked Unknown to them for a history stays out of it, even from before the split.
  • Pick Nothing: its own from the start to undo a split.

In canopy.yaml, next to Whose history:

- id: vey
  name: Kingdom of Vey
  of: Vey
  parent: humans
  split: 412 AK

The sample world has one: The Bellfounders split off from The Dwarves when they cast their first bell.

An event says whose history it's part of in its When box: tap the chips under Whose history, one or more (The Dwarves and The Elves for a war between them). A chip with a dashed edge is a suggestion, never picked for you. Under the chips, the When box says which histories also have it from before they split off. Without a choice, an event is part of The world only. World-shaking events are part of every history. An event added from a history's timeline (with + Event, or by pressing and holding on its scale) starts in that history.

For each history it's part of, an event can also have Their name for it, Their account and How much it matters to them. They show on that history's timeline.

In the file, it's a plain list, readable in Obsidian:

date: 12 DR
histories: [dwarves]

Worlds made before histories had calendars and points of view. They become histories when the world opens, with nothing lost: each calendar becomes a history, and a point of view joins the history of the calendar it used. An event with a point of view's name, account or importance is part of that history (and still of The world); one marked Unknown to them isn't.

The timeline

Timeline in the sidebar lists everything with a date, era by era, each era a band (every other one lightly tinted). Each event is a small round mark on the line; a world-shaking one is a filled mark with a ring around it. On a laptop or bigger, an era's name stays on the left while you scroll past its events.

  • With more than one history, chips at the top pick one: Everything, The world, The Dwarves… A history shows only its own events (and world-shaking ones), grouped by its own eras and dated in its own count. A history that split off shows what it shares from before the split greyed, in the list and To scale.

  • The era strip at the top jumps to an era; Go to a year jumps to a date.

  • Find in the timeline, Kind and Involving narrow it down; Everything / Major and up / World-shaking hides small events.

  • To scale draws events along a line of years: dots for moments, bars for things that last. Lanes split it By kind, By place, By faction or By history (each history side by side). Zoom from millennia to single years, or Fit. Tap an event for its card: its date, summary and fields, with Open page and Edit. The timeline stays where you were; close the card with Back or Escape. Press and hold (or right-click) on an empty spot to add an event at that year.

  • During a campaign, Now marks the present day of the campaign (or, without one, Today in the world).

Later: passages players don't get yet

Select some lines in an article and press Later. Canopy asks Keep this passage back until when?; write a date or a name and press Keep it back. In the editor the passage starts with a small grey label, such as Later: 120 AC, and its lines have a bar beside them instead of their > marks; put the cursor on a line to see or change its Markdown. Players won't see the passage until either:

  • a date: write a date ("120 AC"). Players see the passage once their campaign's Players know up to date reaches it. You see it labelled Players see this from 120 AC;
  • a name: write anything else ("The city burns"). Players see it when you release it from the campaign's Players tab, by hand or with a beat. You see Players see this when you release "The city burns".
  • an event: tap one of the events under Or after an event (type a few letters of its name to find it), or write a link to it, like [[The Fall of Ivy Hall]]. Players see the passage once their Players know up to date is past the end of that event: its Until if it has one, otherwise its date, so an event in "212 DY" waits for all of 212. You see Players see this after The Fall of Ivy Hall (ends 3 Fall 212 DY), and in the editor Later: after The Fall of Ivy Hall. If you move the event, the passage follows it; if you rename it, the link changes with it. An event with no date Canopy can read is held back until you release it by its name, and you're told so.

In the sample world, Thornmere has two: one after Lights under the Water, which Robin already reads, and one after The Crown Is Found, which he doesn't get yet.

A date Canopy can't read, such as a bare "1395" in a world with several eras, is never shown to players by mistake: it's held back, and you see a warning asking you to add an era.

Events dated after Players know up to stay hidden from players too, even when shared. So do births and deaths: a player reading about a character who dies later sees no death date, and their age as if alive. Something still going at their present day, such as a war, shows without its Until: how it ends isn't theirs to know yet. Players only get ages of people they can open, at events they can read. See Players and spoilers.