BCE/CE (aka BC/AD) date storage

One solution would be to use a negative year value to represent BCE dates. For example, instead of storing Homer's birth year as 800BCE, store it as -800. This way, you can still use standard date functions and calculations, but with the understanding that negative values represent BCE dates.

Another solution would be to use a custom date format that includes a BCE/CE indicator. For example, you could store Homer's birth date as "800 BCE" or "800CE". This would require custom parsing and formatting functions, but would make the date representation more explicit.

Here's an example of how to store BCE dates using negative year values in PHP:

// Store Homer's birth year as -800
$birthYear = -800;

// Convert negative year to BCE format for display
if ($birthYear < 0) {
    $bceYear = abs($birthYear) . ' BCE';
} else {
    $bceYear = $birthYear . ' CE';
}

echo "Homer was born in $bceYear";
// Output: Homer was born in 800 BCE