Date: January 14, 1892 full moon
Event: Tibo is reunited with his mother.
Source: ERB does not come right out and tell us how long Tibo spent with Tarzan. In The Witch Doctor Seeks Vengeance it is stated that Bukawi stole Tibo on the second sun after Tarzan allowed the boy to return home. On the very afternoon of Tibo's abduction Tarzan arrives at the village where he hears Moyama crying loudly. Earlier this same day, just before Tarzan sets out for the village we are told, "It had been at least a moon since he had last been to Mbonga's village and played a trick".ERB- Return Of Tarzan. The last recorded trick was the one which led to Tibo's abduction. From these passages it indicates that Tibo was with Tarzan approximately one month.
Since we are told it was "at least one moon" we know Tibo's release was also on or around a full moon. The U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon informs us there was a full moon on January 14, 1892
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Event: Lord Greystoke was shooting pheasants at Chamston-Hedding.
Source: These events occur on the same day Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village and discovers Tibo missing for a second time.
Date: January 17, 1892
Event: Tarzan rescues Tibo once more and returns him to Mbonga's village.
Source: "The following day." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: March 13, 1892 full moon
Event: Tibo is reunited with his mother.
Source: ERB does not come right out and tell us how long Tibo spent with Tarzan. In The Witch Doctor Seeks Vengeance it is stated that Bukawi stole Tibo on the second sun after Tarzan allowed the boy to return home. On the very afternoon of Tibo's abduction Tarzan arrives at the village where he hears Moyama crying loudly. Earlier this same day, just before Tarzan sets out for the village we are told, "It had been at least a moon since he had last been to Mbonga's village and played a trick".ERB- Return Of Tarzan. The last recorded trick was the one which led to Tibo's abduction. From these passages it indicates that Tibo was with Tarzan approximately one month.
Since we are told it was "at least one moon" we know Tibo's release was also on or around a full moon. The U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon informs us there was a full moon on January 14, 1892
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Chat: I found the statement ERB made in chapter five quite puzzling. "Momaya shivered as from a cold wind of the rainy season." In Angola the rainy season is from October through May and it is hot. The dry season which is at the end of June through September, is cool, however, definitely implies that the present weather is warm. On the coast February and March, the hottest month of the year, are very humid and uncomfortable.
 |
| J Allan St John |
Date: January 16, 1892
Event: Tibo is stolen by Bukawai.
Source: "The second sun after Tibo's return." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: January 16, 1872
Event: Tarzan returns to the village and finds Tibo stolen once more.
Source: "It had been at least a moon since he had last been there and played a trick." ERB-
 |
| Artist Unknown |
Event: Tarzan returns to the village and finds Tibo stolen once more.
Source: "It had been at least a moon since he had last been there and played a trick." ERB-
Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: January 16, 1892 |
| Burne Hogarth |
Event: Lord Greystoke was shooting pheasants at Chamston-Hedding.
Source: These events occur on the same day Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village and discovers Tibo missing for a second time.
 |
| Greystoke Castle |
Event: Tarzan rescues Tibo once more and returns him to Mbonga's village.
Source: "The following day." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Artist Unknown |
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to steal arrows and supplies.
Source: Although ERB did not include this event in his writings the date is based on the author's
own descriptions. ERB consistently tells us in many many passages throughout Tarzan Of The Apes and Jungle Tales Of Tarzan that Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village on the full moon to
watch the natives dance and to replenish his arrows and other needs.U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Date: April 12, 1892 full moon
 |
| Boris Vallejo |
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to
steal arrows and supplies.
Source: Although ERB did not include this event in his writings the date is based on the author's
own descriptions. ERB consistently tells us in many many passages throughout Tarzan Of The
Apes and Jungle Tales Of Tarzan that Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village on the full moon to
watch the natives dance and to replenish his arrows and other needs. U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Date: sometime in May, 1892
Event: Bukawi captures Tarzan and the ape man leaves him to the mercy of his own hyena's.
Source: "For months the old witch doctor nursed his hate for the jungle god before a chance to get even occurred." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. As mentioned earlier Angola's rainy season occurs between October through May and because of the mentioned rainstorm the events have to occur "months" after January 17, but before the end of May.
 |
| NC Wyeth |
Event: Bukawi captures Tarzan and the ape man leaves him to the mercy of his own hyena's.
Source: "For months the old witch doctor nursed his hate for the jungle god before a chance to get even occurred." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. As mentioned earlier Angola's rainy season occurs between October through May and because of the mentioned rainstorm the events have to occur "months" after January 17, but before the end of May.
 |
| Bob Abbott |
Date: May 11, 1892 full moon
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to
steal arrows and supplies.
Source: Although ERB did not include this event in his writings the date is based on the author's
own descriptions. ERB consistently tells us in many many passages throughout Tarzan Of The
Apes and Jungle Tales Of Tarzan that Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village on the full moon to
watch the natives dance and to replenish his arrows and other needs. U.S. Naval Observatory
Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Date: sometime in late May or early June, 1892
Event: A lion kills Mamka, a she ape, and Tarzan steal's her body.
Source: There is nothing mentioned in which we can date this event to the exact day, but we do
 |
| Elvio Romero |
Event: A lion kills Mamka, a she ape, and Tarzan steal's her body.
Source: There is nothing mentioned in which we can date this event to the exact day, but we do
know the happenings occur around this point because of the time needed to fulfill the other events.
Date: June 10, 1892 full moon
Source: "A few weeks later," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The events of July 3 occurs seven days before Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village which occurs on a full moon.
 |
| Neil Adams |
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to
steal arrows and supplies.
Source: Although ERB did not include this event in his writings the date is based on the author's
own descriptions. ERB consistently tells us in many many passages throughout Tarzan Of The Apes and Jungle Tales Of Tarzan that Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village on a full moon to watch
the natives dance and to replenish his arrows and other needs. U.S. Naval Observatory
Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Event: Sheeta, the panther, kills a baby Mangani and sentries are formed. |
| Jamie Chase |
Date: July 3, 1892
Source: "A few weeks later," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The events of July 3 occurs seven days before Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village which occurs on a full moon.
 |
| Joe Jusko |
Date: July 10, 1892 full moon
Event: Tarzan returns to the village and steals a complete lion skin that belongs to Rabba Kega from Mbonga's hut.
Source: "Several days later." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. Since Tarzan is at Mbonga's village it is most probably one of his full moon visits. The U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon informs us of a full moon on July 10, 1892.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Date: July 11, 1892
Event: Tarzan attempts to play a trick on the Mangani and is almost killed.
Source: "The following day," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Huy Truong |
Event: Tarzan attempts to play a trick on the Mangani and is almost killed.
Source: "The following day," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Jeffery Jones |
Date: August 8, 1892 full moon
Event: Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village and steals food and has nightmares.
Source: There is nothing mentioned, by ERB in which we can date this event, except Tarzan's
regular habit to go to the village on a full moon to watch the natives dance and to steal arrows. Checking the U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The
Moon we discover that a full moon occurs August 8, 1892.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Chat: The following passage may also be used as a dating clue. "there had been a disease ravaging through the plains for several years that made game very scarce. Due to this many of the great cats abandoned the grasslands and moved into the jungle. This overpopulation of cats eventually also
Chat: The following passage may also be used as a dating clue. "there had been a disease ravaging through the plains for several years that made game very scarce. Due to this many of the great cats abandoned the grasslands and moved into the jungle. This overpopulation of cats eventually also
made game hard to find there as well." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Joe Jusko |
Date: August 9, 1892
Event: Tarzan kills his second gorilla.
Source: "Next day," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: September 6, 1892 full moon
Date: October 2, 1892
Event: Toog kidnaps Teeka.
Source: "many weeks had past since the tribe had been attacked by a foe." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. During these events a rain storm is mentioned which means Angola's rainy season, October through May, is setting in. Because of the full moon on October 6 we know these events occur in the first days of October.
Also take note of ERB's descriptions of Gazan, "young balu"' "little Gazan"' and "young ape"' According to Dian Fossey, author of Gorilla's In The Mist, "Only when the new born was nine months old had it developed into an active and socially inclined baby." In this last description of Teeka's balu, notice that no event in Jungle Tales Of Tarzan has ever hinted that Gazan has reached the weaning age. According to Dian Fossey, "Weaning periods become the most traumatic for gorilla infants around the age of two and one half years."
We also know this event has to occur after September 1, 1892 because two clues in chapter ten states that Tarzan is twenty years old. "On the floor lay the skeleton of a man - all that remained of the former Lord Greystoke - lay as it had fallen some twenty years before when Kerchak, the great ape, had thrown it, lifeless, there," ERB-Jungle Tales.Of Tarzan. "He did not know that the dead father of Tarzan of the Apes, reaching back out of the past across a span of twenty years, had saved his son's life," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: October 3, 1892
Event: Tarzan puts Rabba Kega in the lion's cage.
Source: "One restless day" ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. Because of the mentioned October rain storm and the October 6 full moon we know these events occur at the very first of October.
Date: October 4, 1892
Event: Tarzan loosens the lion in Mbonga's village.
Source: "The following day." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
Date: October 5, 1892
Event: Tarzan came across six of Mbonga's hunters caught in the jungle after dark.
Source: "one night." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The day before rescuing Bulabantu.
Date: October 6, 1892 full moon
Event: Tarzan kills Bulabantu and Taug kills Gunto.
Source: This occurs one moon before the eclipse. ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. U.S. Navel Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
Date: November 4, 1892 a full moon and lunar eclipse.
Event: Tarzan rescues the moon.
Source: "See! Goro is emerging from the belly of Numa," and, sure enough, the moon was gradually emerging from whatever had devoured her, whether it was Numa, the lion, or the shadow of the earth;" ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The actual lunar eclipse of November 4, 1892. U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
Date: November 6, 1892
Event: Tarzan kills Kerchak and becomes King.
Source: The same day Tarzan wakes at noon. ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
Date: December 4, 1892 full moon
Event: Tarzan kills his second gorilla.
Source: "Next day," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Robert Abbott |
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to steal arrows and supplies.
Source: Although ERB did not include this event in his writings the date is based on the author's
own descriptions. ERB consistently tells us in many many passages throughout Tarzan Of The Apes and Jungle Tales Of Tarzan that Tarzan goes to Mbonga's village on a full moon to watch the natives dance and to replenish his arrows and other needs. U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
Date: October 2, 1892
Event: Toog kidnaps Teeka.
Source: "many weeks had past since the tribe had been attacked by a foe." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. During these events a rain storm is mentioned which means Angola's rainy season, October through May, is setting in. Because of the full moon on October 6 we know these events occur in the first days of October.
Also take note of ERB's descriptions of Gazan, "young balu"' "little Gazan"' and "young ape"' According to Dian Fossey, author of Gorilla's In The Mist, "Only when the new born was nine months old had it developed into an active and socially inclined baby." In this last description of Teeka's balu, notice that no event in Jungle Tales Of Tarzan has ever hinted that Gazan has reached the weaning age. According to Dian Fossey, "Weaning periods become the most traumatic for gorilla infants around the age of two and one half years."
We also know this event has to occur after September 1, 1892 because two clues in chapter ten states that Tarzan is twenty years old. "On the floor lay the skeleton of a man - all that remained of the former Lord Greystoke - lay as it had fallen some twenty years before when Kerchak, the great ape, had thrown it, lifeless, there," ERB-Jungle Tales.Of Tarzan. "He did not know that the dead father of Tarzan of the Apes, reaching back out of the past across a span of twenty years, had saved his son's life," ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| Hal Foster |
Event: Tarzan puts Rabba Kega in the lion's cage.
Source: "One restless day" ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. Because of the mentioned October rain storm and the October 6 full moon we know these events occur at the very first of October.
 |
| Rodrido Ramos |
Event: Tarzan loosens the lion in Mbonga's village.
Source: "The following day." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan.
 |
| J. Allen St. John |
Event: Tarzan came across six of Mbonga's hunters caught in the jungle after dark.
Source: "one night." ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The day before rescuing Bulabantu.
 |
| Robert Zeuschner |
Event: Tarzan kills Bulabantu and Taug kills Gunto.
Source: This occurs one moon before the eclipse. ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. U.S. Navel Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
Date: November 4, 1892 a full moon and lunar eclipse.
Event: Tarzan rescues the moon.
Source: "See! Goro is emerging from the belly of Numa," and, sure enough, the moon was gradually emerging from whatever had devoured her, whether it was Numa, the lion, or the shadow of the earth;" ERB-Jungle Tales Of Tarzan. The actual lunar eclipse of November 4, 1892. U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
www.rodurago.net/en/index.php?link=calendar&site=details
Date: Afternoon November 5, 1892 to noon November 6, 1892
Event: After skinning Sabor Tarzan went to sleep and slept until noon the following day.
Source: "What with loss of sleep, ardnous exercise, and a full belly, Tarzan of the Apes slept the sun around, awakening about noon the following day. ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
 |
| Artist Unknown |
Jungle Tales Of Tarzan comes to a close. Tarzan Of The Apes resumes.
Date: November 5, 1892
Event: On the way home Tarzan kills Sabor, the lioness.
Source: "mid-afternoon" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. This event occurs the following day after the lunar eclipse.
Date: November 5, 1892
Event: William Cecil Clayton's father is speaking in the House of Lords.
Source: "And in London another Lord Greystoke was speaking to his kind in the House of Lords,
Date: November 5, 1892
Event: On the way home Tarzan kills Sabor, the lioness.
Source: "mid-afternoon" ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. This event occurs the following day after the lunar eclipse.
 |
| Nestor Redondo |
Event: William Cecil Clayton's father is speaking in the House of Lords.
Source: "And in London another Lord Greystoke was speaking to his kind in the House of Lords,
but none trembled at the sound of his soft voice." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. We know this is William Cecil's father because of the statement ERB makes when Tarzan rescues William Cecil on the beach. "Clayton's only response was a shrug of the shoulders, but as he left them he picked up the spear
which had transfixed Snipes, and thus primitively armed, the son of the then Lord Greystoke strode
into the dense jungle." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. Again when Tarzan rescues William Cecil from Sheeta, the leopard, it is stated, "He was no coward; but if ever a man felt the icy fingers of fear upon his heart, William Cecil Clayton, eldest son of Lord Greystoke of England, did that day in the fastness of the African jungle." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
 |
| House Of Lords |
Event: After skinning Sabor Tarzan went to sleep and slept until noon the following day.
Source: "What with loss of sleep, ardnous exercise, and a full belly, Tarzan of the Apes slept the sun around, awakening about noon the following day. ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
 |
| Burne Hogarth |
Event: Tarzan kills Kerchak and becomes King.
Source: The same day Tarzan wakes at noon. ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes.
 |
| Paul Privitera |
Event: Tarzan made an unrecorded visit to Mbonga's village to watch the natives dance and to steal arrows and supplies.
Source: "During this period Tarzan paid many nocturnal visits to the village, where he often renewed his supply of arrows." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. "Once every moon Tarzan would go swinging rapidly back through the swaying branches to have a day with his books, and to replenish his supply of arrows." ERB-Tarzan Of The Apes. Full moon date provided by U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department's Phases Of The Moon.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
James Michael Moody is a lifelong fan and collector of Edger Rice Burroughs. Over the past forty-five years, Moody has contributed over two hundred articles to various ERB-related fanzines. He also manages an unauthorized Tarzan blog titled Greystoke Chronologist: James Michael Moody. There, the researcher chronologies the Tarzan books starting in May 1872 (known as the pushback theory) instead of the more accepted date, May 1888.
James Michael Moody also authorizes the action-packed Sci-Fi fantasy adventure Unium series. Pioneers On Unium, published December 31, 2019, Exiled On Unium, published August 25, 2022, and Swordsman On Unium, published on July 15, 2024.
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