Father Time is the anthropomorphized depiction of time. He is usually depicted as an elderly bearded man, dressed in a robe and carrying a scythe and an hourglass or other timekeeping device (which represents time's constant one-way movement, and more generally and abstractly, entropy). This image derives from several sources, including the Grim Reaper and Chronos: Greek God of Time.
Around New Year's Eve many 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.
Read more about Father Time: In Popular Culture
Famous quotes containing the words father and/or time:
“If your little savage were left to himself and be allowed to retain all his ignorance, he would in time join the infant’s reasoning to the grown man’s passion, he would strangle his father and sleep with his mother.”
—Denis Diderot (1713–1784)
“It is not necessary that every time he rises he should give his famous imitation of a semi-house-trained polecat.”
—Michael Foot (b. 1913)