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The City of the Saved

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A CITY OF THE SAVED CHRONOLOGY

Story titles are in bold. City years are arbitrary, but equivalent in length to Earth years. Not all the dates given in the Who’s Who in the City of the Saved entries are listed, primarily to avoid turning this page into a Mesh Cos bibliography [1]. The Chronology contains SPOILERS for all of the City of the Saved stories to date.

Years After Foundation (AF)
0	‘Salutation’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [2]; Resurrection Day; appareance of Godfather Avatar [3]; ‘Akroates’ (Tales of the City) [4]; ‘Weighty Questions’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [5].
1	Mesh Cos accepted by consensus as Resident for Samphire District [6]; University of the Seven Ages founded [7].
2	Lucius Cassius Ignotus founds the Ignotian Corporation [8]; Parallaxia div Procyon joins the Civil Reserve force [9]; Inigo Faber joins the faculty at the University of the Seven Ages [10].
3	Manfold declares independence from the City [11]; Citizens begin to settle Bribori Zadig; the Cormoran Trust is set up [12].
6	Bribori Zadig closed to the public [13].
7	Merla Gupta born [14].
8	Allisheer St Marx appointed Chair of Chronic Theory at the Collegium Humanitas [15].
9	Death on the Sidewalk by Baines Molesti published [16].
10	Anthony Fisher appointed to fellowship at Aelfred College [17].
12	Same Old Heaven But a New Earth by Philip K Dick published [18]; Collaterals (Citizenship) Act passed [19]; Gargil Krymtorpor founds the Ghetto of the Damned [20].
22	Ved Mostyn contracts group marriage with 243 members of the Oval Fulfilment sect [21].
30	Merla Gupta joins BardCorp [22]; ‘Eliminating the Impossible’ (Tales of the Great Detectives) [23].
33	Lon Shel born [24].
35	Lemuel Gulliver’s Remake created [25].
37	‘Sleeping Giants’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [26].
51	Ignotus elected to the Senate of the Romuline District [27].
52	‘Driving Home for Atonatiuh’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [28].
c 60	‘Happily Ever After Is a High-Risk Strategy’ (Tales of the City) [29].
71	‘The Socratic Problem’ (Tales of the City) [30].
73	Amanda Legend Lefcourt born [31].
84	City Olympiad lifts ban on collateral contestants [32].
89	Dick’s The Parasite Angels published [33].
c 100	Jenny Wray stops visiting her parents regularly [34].
104	Ignotus elected Consul of the Romuline [35].
107	Dick’s The Insidious Apotheosis of Bernhardt Fleck published [36].
c 115	Melicia Clutterbuck born [37].
c 131 - c 139	Lewis Greaves begins work on a comprehensive history of humanity by spending eight years persuading Aa, the first woman, to talk to him [38].
c 140-48	‘The Smallest Spark’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [39].
142	Ignotus elected Resident for the Romuline [40].
c 150	Preview to Warlords of Utopia [41]; ‘Lost Ships and Lost Lands’ (Tales of the City) [42]; ‘Saqqaf’, ‘Young Sherlock Holmes and the Mansion of Doom’, ‘The Case of the Pipe Dream’ and ‘Art in the Blood’ (Tales of the Great Detectives) [43].
c 160	‘The Places Above, Between and Below’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [44].
189	Faction Paradox: A negotiable history by Selene Walmric published [45]; Philip K Dick goes missing [46].
191	The Insidious Apotheosis of Bernhardt Fleck filmed as Grasshopper Sky [47].
194	Dick’s How to Create Universes in Your Spare Time for Fun and Profit published [48].
197	St Marx appointed Senior Chair of Archemathics at the University of the Lower Watchtower [49].
198	Parallaxia acquiesced to as Resident for Orlack District [50].
204	The Human Species: A Spotter’s Guide by Melicia Clutterbuck published [51].
209	Marriage of Fisher and St Marx [52].
223-250	Het Linc (The Book of the War) [53].
c 240	‘Highbury’ (Tales of the City) [54].
241	Mostyn acclaimed Resident for Wormward District [55].
c 244	First broadcast of BardCorp’s The Prosperos [56].
c 245	Exchange of embassies with Mictlan [57]; Foaming Sky, Lord / Ghetto of the Damned, The / Worldofme (The Book of the War) [58].
c 250	‘About a Girl’ (Tales of the City) [59]; ‘The Adventure of the Piltdown Prelate’ (Tales of the Great Detectives) [60]; ‘The Baker Street Dozen’ (Tales of the Great Detectives) [61].
255	Krymtorpor resigns as leader of the Ghetto of the Damned [62].
260	Verrifant becomes Lord Mayor [63].
c 261	‘We Only Live Twice (But the City Is Not Enough)’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [64].
262	Mantissa, Lady / Timebeast Assault, The / Verrifant, Former Citizen (The Book of the War) [65].
265	Potent Weapons (Development) Act passed [66].
267	Lefcourt’s embassy to Mictlan ends [67].
c 269	Julian White Mammoth Tusk born [68].
c 271	Lucillius Urbanus Ignotus born [69]; Geraldine makes her first attempt to track down Jenny Wray [70].
275-76	Fisher and St Marx on sabbatical at Manfold College [71].
276	Omphalos! by Vril published [72].
c 277	Jenny Wray falls out with her parents [73].
c 281 - c 282	‘The Long-Distance Somnambulist’ (More Tales of the City) [74].
282	St Marx elected Resident for Base and Buttress District [75]; St Marx, Mesh, Mostyn, Ignotus and Parallaxia selected as Councillors [76].
c 285	‘The Mystery of the Rose’ (More Tales of the City) [77].
c 287	A Don Juan de Marco Remake, later Little Brother Edward, created [78].
c 290	‘Bruises’ (Tales of the City) [79]; ‘Double Trouble at the Parasites on the Proletariat Club’ (More Tales of the City) [80].
290	New edition of Who’s Who in the City of the Saved published [81].
291	City census, according to Vril’s Omphalos! [82]; Molesti’s Fabergé Street published [83]; ‘Eternity is Just for Starters’, ‘The Isis Method’, ‘Born in a Briar Patch’, and framing narrative (More Tales of the City) [84]; Preview to Of the City of the Saved [85]; Of the City of the Saved [86]; ‘Unification Theory’ [87].
291 - c 300	Civil War [88].
292	Parallaxia becomes Deputy Mayor [89].
294	The Book of the War is published [90].
c 295	‘The Night is Long, and Dreams Are Legion’ (Myth Makers 14) [91].
300	Dick’s The Next Time I’m God, You Can Be the Devil published [92]; ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’ (A Romance in Twelve Parts) [93]; ‘Apocalypse Day’ (Tales of the City) [94]; ‘God Encompasses’ (Furthest Tales of the City) [95].

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Notes

[1] They can easily be found, however, on pp35, 45, 53 and 139 of Of the City of the Saved (the entries for Ved Mostyn, Mesh Cos, Allisheer St Marx and Anthony Fisher respectively), the deleted sidebars (Lucius Cassius Ignotus’ entry), and p208 of A Romance in Twelve Parts (the entry for Parallaxia div Procyon).

[2] The story’s events take place on the morning of Resurrection Day [Furthest Tales of the City pp5, 10].

[3] Of the City of the Saved p61.

[4] The story begins with the Isoptaline’s experience of resurrection. It is unclear how much time passes after this, but City society is still in its infancy at the end of the story.

[5] Tales of the City pp6-8. The incidents Akroates remembers happen soon after Resurrection Day.

[6] Of the City of the Saved p45.

[7] Tales of the City p31.

[8] Of the City of the Saved, deleted sidebars.

[9] A Romance in Twelve Parts p208.

[10] Tales of the City p31.

[11] Of the City of the Saved p105.

[12] Furthest Tales of the City pp37, 55.

[13] ‘the year before’ Merla’s birth [Furthest Tales of the City p40].

[14] Merla has had ‘thirty years to master’ the Civil Tongue’s idioms [Furthest Tales of the City p50].

[15] Of the City of the Saved p53.

[16] Of the City of the Saved p15.

[17] Of the City of the Saved pp136, 139.

[18] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[19] Of the City of the Saved p190.

[20] The Book of the War pp72, 108.

[21] Of the City of the Saved p35.

[22] ‘seven years’ before ‘Sleeping Giants’ [Furthest Tales of the City p45].

[23] It’s been ‘thirty years, fifty- six days, twenty-two hours, and a handful of minutes’ since Resurrection Day [Tales of the Great Detectives p40].

[24] Of the City of the Saved pp18, 145.

[25] ‘two years’ before ‘Sleeping Giants’ [Furthest Tales of the City p50].

[26] Furthest Tales of the City pp35, 46.

[27] Of the City of the Saved, deleted sidebars.

[28] Furthest Tales of the City pp76-77, 81, 87.

[29] The stories in Tales of the City happen in chronological order, so this takes place before ‘The Socratic Problem’. Cranzfraction has concluded ‘the best part of 50 years’ of harassing Niney Flanc9 some time previously [Tales of the City p19].

[30] Faber is ‘months’ from the end of a 70-year contract he signed ‘a couple of years after Resurrection’ [Tales of the City p31].

[31] The Book of the War p110.

[32] The Book of the War p82.

[33] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[34] This happens after ‘a hundred years or so’ according to Lewis Greaves [More Tales of the City p25].

[35] Of the City of the Saved, deleted sidebars.

[36] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[37] She’s ‘in her hundred-and-seventies’ in Of the City of the Saved [p76] – although oddly, a character in Furthest Tales of the City reads one of her books in 37 [p41]. We might imagine a number of scenarios involving copies of her books being exported through the Uptime Gate and somehow imported earlier than they left, but Merla makes it sound as if Clutterbuck is already a well-known author. The easiest assumption might be that Clutterbuck has an ancestor of the same name, whose fame in the field of humanology she later eclipses.

[38] He starts ‘about a hundred and fifty years’ before the beginning of ‘The Long-Distance Somnambulist’ [More Tales of the City p19].

[39] There is no specific dating information for ‘The Smallest Spark’, although the action unfolds over a period of at least nine years [Furthest Tales of the City pp100, 101, 113]. The stories in Furthest Tales of the City are chronological, so this must happen after ‘Driving Home for Atonatiuh’.

[40] Of the City of the Saved, deleted sidebars.

[41] Of the City of the Saved pp250-51. The dating is vague: it's a generic point in City history, after Resurrection Day but prior to the Civil War.

[42] Brianna has been travelling the City for ‘150 years’ [ Tales of the City p60]. Given her character, she presumably started shortly after Resurrection Day.

[43] The stories in Tales of the Great Detectives are not necessarily in chronological order. For most of the stories there is no dating information, except that they take place after the foundation of the Great Detective Agency and before the Civil War. The agoraphobic Holmes in ‘Art in the Blood’ has had ‘a good many years’ to get over his condition. (The story ‘Sussex’ is a flashback to Holmes’s fictional death, and is thus fundamentally undateable.)

[44] There is no specific dating information for ‘The Places Above, Between and Below’.

[45] Of the City of the Saved p25.

[46] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[47] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[48] Of the City of the Saved p197.

[49] Of the City of the Saved p53.

[50] A Romance in Twelve Parts p208.

[51] Of the City of the Saved p27.

[52] Of the City of the Saved pp36, 53, 139.

[53] The Book of the War p85.

[54] The characters consult a copy of The Human Species: A Spotter’s Guide which is old enough to fall open naturally at the entry for the Ettin [Tales of the City pp81-83, 93]. The story has to take place before ‘About a Girl’. The date is confirmed in Furthest Tales of the City [p147].

[55] Of the City of the Saved p35.

[56] It’s ‘in its fiftieth successful year’ in 294 [The Book of the War pp33-34].

[57] There’s a contradiction between the ‘Ghetto of the Damned’ entry in The Book of the War, which has Foaming Sky’s embassy to the City beginning in 261 [p72], and Deputy Mayor Parallaxia in ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’, who dates his subsequent invasion attempt to ‘the 240s’ [A Romance in Twelve Parts p203]. Since Of the City of the Saved establishes The Book of the War as an unreliable guide to City history [p93], it seems reasonable to trust the Deputy Mayor (see Note).

[58] This occurs at some point after Lord Foaming Sky becomes the Celestis Ambassador to the City.

[59] Tales of the City pp106, 107, 108. On the face of it, Phil Dick’s public presence in the story contradicts his reported disappearance in 189, which Of the City of the Saved implies lasts until his life as Rick Kithred in Paynesdown in 291. However, Phil’s absence is mentioned only in the ‘About the Author’ blurb from How to Create Universes in Your Spare Time for Fun and Profit, published only five years later, so it’s possible he emerged from and then re-entered hiding. ‘Apocalypse Day’ implies that Phil’s self-seclusion from the City is intermittent and periodic [Tales of the City p152].

[60] The story takes place in ‘the year 2––’ [Tales of the Great Detectives p117]. It’s been ‘many years’ since Conan Doyle was imprisoned following his actions in ‘Eliminating the Impossible’ [Tales of the Great Detectives p129].

[61] No specific dating information is given, but the complete automation of the Watson Remaking process suggests a later date than those of most other stories in the volume. It’s ‘seven years’ since three Watson Remakes fell down a light well at the Acme Watson Facility and ‘a hundred years’ since the arrest of three Moriarty Remakes [Tales of the Great Detectives pp143, 147].

[62] The Book of the War pp108-09, although see Note.

[63] The Book of the War p209.

[64] Sophy Maitland left Highbury District ‘twenty years’ ago; this is sometime after the events of ‘Highbury’ in 240 [Furthest Tales of the City p147]. Since ‘Highbury’ ends with Sophy determined to stay and reform the District, we should assume that this was not immediate. The fact that ‘We Only Live Twice (But the City Is Not Enough)’ is predicated on the lack of risk in the City, though – and that nobody brings the Timebeast Assault up in discussions of this – strongly suggests that it takes place before the events of 262.

[65] The Book of the War pp85, 121, 192, Of the City of the Saved p37.

[66] Of the City of the Saved p190.

[67] The Book of the War p110, although see Note.

[68] Of the City of the Saved p18.

[69] Of the City of the Saved p22. This means that Urbanus came of age at 17 [p20], which would have been older than average, but not out of the ordinary, for a youth in ancient Rome.

[70] This happens ‘ten years back’ before the beginning of ‘The Long-Distance Somnambulist’ [More Tales of the City p18].

[71] Of the City of the Saved pp53, 139.

[72] Of the City of the Saved p276.

[73] This happens ‘about five years’ before the end of the time of of ‘The Long-Distance Somnambulist’ [More Tales of the City p25].

[74] Lewis Greaves initially implies this took place ‘a few years ago’ or ‘five years ago’, but also that this information is false[p10]. Later he refers to the story’s conclusion happening ‘nine years back’, without further qualification [p26]; the action takes place over rather more than ‘about a year or so’ [p23].

[75] Of the City of the Saved p53.

[76] Of the City of the Saved pp35, 45, 53, deleted sidebar, A Romance in Twelve Parts p208. In fact, as is made clear in Of the City of the Saved pp37-38, each Council serves a 10-year fixed term – with the exception of Verrifant’s, which stepped down after two years [p50], and that serving at the time of Of the City of the Saved, who remain in session as an emergency measure [p245]. This dating will therefore apply to all the Councillors mentioned in Of the City of the Saved, though those in ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’ might be replacements for casualties of war like Mostyn or renegades like St Marx.

[77] The story implies that Cllr Plantagenet has replaced a sitting Councillor rather than being selected in an election year [pp115, 119]. In any case, he’s still in post at the time of the More Tales of the City framing narrative [p131], so the story (in which he's positioning himself for public approval on his selection) can’t take place much earlier than 280 or so, or any later than 290. There’s no clue in the story as to when the Richard III Remake was created.

78] Of the City of the Saved p101.

[79] It’s ‘nearly three centuries’ since Resurrection [Tales of the City p136], but clearly prior to the events of Of the City of the Saved.

[80] The story concerns ‘a recent turn of events’ according to Hal Benson [p33], although what he actually means by this is anyone’s guess.

[81] Of the City of the Saved p35. This can’t be the last edition published, as one from after 292 is quoted in ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’ [A Romance in Twelve Parts p208].

[82] Of the City of the Saved p276. Given that Vril’s book is published in 276 – and especially given the impossibility of time-travel in the City – there’s an obvious anomaly here, which is best explained by a typo.

[83] Of the City of the Saved p15. OK, so strictly speaking the date given on the page is 29, but this is another typo (corrected in the ebook). Even Baines Molesti doesn’t write 10 novels a year.

[84] Both ‘Eternity is Just for Starters’ and ‘The Isis Method’ involve or imply recent violent incidents [pp 73, 82, 144, 156]. Although there’s no indication that the narrators or anyone else in the framing story (with which ‘Born in a Briar Patch’ is contemporaneous) are aware of the very public events of Of the City of the Saved, we’re told that the City is changing and will soon be in a state of Civil War [p161]. It seem clear that all these stories, and the anthology as a whole, happen in the narrow window between Antipathy's influence beginning to seep out into the City and its public discovery. Beyond Lena Dmitri being ‘young’ [p60], which could mean anything, there's no clue as to when she was born.

[85] Immediately before Of the City of the Saved.

[86] Of the City of the Saved pp141, 167, 172, 212. Specifically (although again the typo on p15 obscures it), the main action takes place between the 4th and the 10th days of the fourth month. There was some reason for this, possibly to do with the dates of Easter, but it now escapes me.

[87] During Chapter 70 of Of the City of the Saved.

[88] ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’ is short on dates, but the Civil War begins in Of the City of the Saved [p246] and finishes on Apocalypse Day. There’s a slight anomaly in that the orientation material prepared by UniMac in ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’ refers to the invulnerability protocols being in place ‘a year ago’ [A Romance in Twelve Parts p202], but in the absence of context we may assume that this is an early draft of the briefing.

[89] A Romance in Twelve Parts p208.

[90] The Book of the War p33. Note, though, that contact between the City and the external universe ceases in 291, but that this goes unmentioned in The Book. This may be another point on which its City chronology is unreliable (see Note).

[91] (‘The Night is Long, and Dreams Are Legion’ is Mags L. Halliday’s pendant to her Faction Paradox novel Warring States, published in the fanzine Myth Makers.) It’s ‘two centuries’ since George Morrison engaged the Great Detective Agency. The narrator suggests that death and war are ‘impossible’, but this is in the context of the history of the City’s Chinatowns. Morrison’s leg is twice said to be causing him pain, so this can only take place after the events of Of the City of the Saved.

[92] A Romance in Twelve Parts p208.

[93] ‘Apocalypse Day’ occurs in the immediate aftermath of ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’.

[94] Sophy thinks the lifetime of the city has been ‘300 years’ [Tales of the City p154].

[95] A short time after ‘Apocalypse Day’, and within 24 hours of the end of ‘A Hundred Words from a Civil War’.

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NOTE

The Book of the War (the real-world book with an ISBN of 1570329052, that is, not the in-fiction almanac of the Faction Paradox universe whose text is, leaving aside the interference of the Shift, identical) is an unreliable guide to City chronology partly because the dates of the Celestis-related events were changed in the editing process. Originally Lefcourt and Foaming Sky’s embassies began in 186 and ended, in Lefcourt’s case, in 192, while Krymtorpor’s resignation took place in 215. This was to ensure that all the relevant events took part during the 50 years of the War as covered in The Book of the War, but I still have some serious difficulty remembering what exactly was established.

The reason Of the City of the Saved takes place before The Book of the War, despite its events not being mentioned there, is because of a never-fully-explored idea on the part of the editorship that each of the Mad Norwegian Faction Paradox volumes happens before its predecessor – hence the war is ‘in its forty-eighth year’ in the ‘The Story So Far’ section of Of the City of the Saved (p3). A careful comparison of the equivalent sections in Warlords of Utopia (‘forty-sixth year’) and Warring States (‘forty-first year’) confirms this.

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• Buy City of the Saved books at Peculiar Tomes or Obverse Books.

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