While there are no specific dates mentioned, the adventures of Emil take place in Sweden vaguely around the years of 1899-1911. Several references are made to swedish cultural, social and military phenomena that ended in the early 1900s. A comet is mentioned, most likely Halley's Comet which passed Earth in 1910. There is also a mention of a great earthquake in America, an obvious reference to the San Francisco earthquake of 1906.