Rob you have to realise that while time is a real thing, we humans view it from our perspective which is based on the orbit of our planet around a star we call the sun. Time was invented when man started to find a way to measure it. Yet time was and will always be there it is infinite from the past, present and into the future. These three actually occur simultaneouly as mankind will one day discover. So in ancient times the sun and stars were our measurement, recently yhe creation of the clock is our measurement, but in the future when finally identifies time for what it is, well that is another question that our eminent scientist D. A. Morgan could try to fathom for you.