Haida Calendar

The Haida people of the Haida Gwaii islands have a simple but interesting system of counting the months. An entire year is called a "cold," or, as we should say, a “winter,” and originally this was divided into two periods of six months each, with a thirteenth month intercalated between them.  In enumerating these to me they began with the summer series, recommencing their count with the winter series.

Both the Gregorian Calendar and the Haida calendar have 365 days. And every Haida calendar starts on a Sunday and ends on a Saturday.  Names Days of the week are Gregorian for now, and the year our calendar started is to be discussed at another time.
So to compare:  

Gregorian = 13 Haida Moon

January 1st - 01 Táan ḵungáay 1st - Black Bear Moon
January 29th - 02 Hlgit'un ḵungáay 1st - Canadian Geese Moon
February 26th - 03 Xitgáas ḵungáay 1st - Noisy Geese Moon
March 26th - 04 Xiit ḵungáay 1st - Bird Moon
April 23rd - 05 Ta Hálaa ḵungáay 1st - Gathering Moon
May 21st - 06 Gáan ḵungáay 1st - Berries start to ripen Moon

June 18th - 07 ḵung ḵuyáans 1st - Precious Moon
July 16th - * Haida New Years * - A day out of time

July 17th - 08 Gáan Gálang ḵungáay 1st - Berries are Ripe Moon
August 14th - 09 Chiin ḵungáay 1st - Salmon Moon
September 11th - 10 ḵ'iit'aas ḵungáay 1st - Berry Basket Weaving Moon
October 9th - 11 ḵálk ḵungáay 1st - Ice Moon
November 6th - 12 Cha'áaw ḵungáay 1st - Bears Dig their dens Moon
December 4th - 13 T'a'áaw ḵungáay 1st - Snow Moon


All the months look like this:

To convert a Gregorian Calendar date to Haida Calendar date visit:


It is said in the Raven story that, when Raven had thrown the moon up into the sky, he called a dog and said to him, "Shall I make four moons ?" But the dog wanted to have six. Then Raven said to him, "What will you do when spring comes on (and the food is almost gone)?” And the dog said, “I will move my feet in front of my face,” as dogs are said to do when they are hungry. So Raven established six moons in each series.

At Massett the low tides are said not to have been named, but Raven gave names to two of the high tides in spring. The new-moon tide at the end of the first summer month was called "dune?", which signifies it was thought that deaths would always occur at this high tide. The high tide on the full moon following the above was called "Tl’ao a‘ninaas?", which probably means that the shell-fish were then deeply buried under the ocean, the one before the big one.” Raven ordained that this tide should be the highest.