Village Time!

  It was once discussed between enthusiasts of ‘the Prisoner,’ how it’s possible for Number 6 to be sure of the correct time of the day in The Village? Yes Number 6 wears a wrist watch, but interestingly there is no clock in his cottage. So if Number 6’s wrist watch says eight for example, how can he be sure that is the actual hour of the day? There is a simple way to check if his wrist watch is telling the right time, by making a sun clock.

   A simple way would be for Number 6 get a stick about two feet in length, and a handful of stones. On a sunny say, perhaps on the beach, stick the said stick in the sand at 7am, use one of the stones to mark where the shadow of the stick falls on the ground. Then return to the sun clock an hour later and use another stone to mark the hour of eight, and so on, nine, ten, eleven, twelve and so on. The shadows would get shorter towards mid day, midday being the shortest shadow, then they start to get longer again. Carry on in this way until dusk and the sun clock would be complete at the days end. This way Number 6 would be sure that his wrist watch tallied with the correct time of day.
   It would have been a doddle for Number 6 to have made himself a sun clock, after all he made himself a compass in ‘Many Happy Returns.’

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