Father Time is a character that has appeared in the 1980s Smurfs cartoon show from Season 3's "How To Smurf A Rainbow" to Season 9's "The Smurfs That Time Forgot". He is an elderly figure who has power and control over time, if not complete control. He wears a long grey beard, is dressed a long robe, and carries a scythe in his hand, which can open up tears in the fabric of space and time by careless people wielding it. He has an underground workshop usually accessible from a cave entrance, in which he has all sorts of devices and apparatuses that control elements of time. One of these devices, a backwards-running grandfather clock, had turned three adult Smurfs into young Smurflings. He has an unexplained relationship with Mother Nature.
Father Time is mentioned in the comic book version of "The Smurflings" but does not actually appear in the story.
His character was voiced by Alan Oppenheimer.
History[]
Father Time is a personification of time. In recent centuries he is usually depicted as an elderly bearded man, sometimes with wings, dressed in a robe and carrying a scythe and an hourglass or other timekeeping device.
As an image, "Father Time's origins are curious." The ancient Greeks themselves began to associate chronos, their word for time, with the god Cronos, who had the attribute of a harvester's sickle. The Romans equated Cronos with Saturn, who also had a sickle, and was treated as an old man, often with a crutch. The wings and hourglass were early Renaissance additions and he eventually became a companion of the Grim Reaper, personification of Death, often taking his scythe. He may have as an attribute a snake with its tail in its mouth, an ancient Egyptian symbol of eternity.
New Year[]
Around New Year's Eve, the media (in particular editorial cartoons) use the convenient trope of Father Time as the personification of the previous year (or "the Old Year") who typically "hands over" the duties of time to the equally allegorical Baby New Year (or "the New Year") or who otherwise characterizes the preceding year. In these depictions, Father Time is usually depicted wearing a sash with the old year's date on it.
Time (in his allegorical form) is often depicted revealing or unveiling the allegorical Truth, sometimes at the expense of a personification of Falsehood, Fraud, or Envy. This theme is related to the idea of veritas filia temporis (Time is the father of Truth).