a career in arms; fought and distinguished
himself by his valour against the Teutonic knights at Tannenberg in 1410,
to their utter defeat; signalised himself afterwards against the Turks,
and in 1413 fought on the English side at Agincourt; failing to rouse
Wenceslas to avenge the death of HUSS (q. v.) and of JEROME
OF PRAGUE (q. v.), he joined the Hussites, organised their forces,
assumed the chief command, and in 1420 gained, with a force of 4000 men,
a victory over the Emperor Sigismund with an army of 40,000 mustered to
crush him; captured next year the castle of Prague, erected fortresses
over the country, one in particular called Tabor, whence the name
Taborites given to his party; blind of one eye from his childhood, lost
the other at the siege of Ratz, fought on blind notwithstanding, gaining
victory after victory, but was seized with the plague and carried off by
it at Czaslav, where his remains were buried and his big mace or
battle-club, mostly iron, hung honourably on the wall close by; that his
skin was tanned and made into the cover of a drum is a fable; he was a
tough soldier, and is called once and again in Carlyle's "Frederick"
"Rhinoceros Ziska" (1360-1424).

ZITTAU (25), a town of Saxony, 71 m. SE. of Dresden, with a
magnificent Rathhaus; stands on a vast lignite deposit; manufactures
cotton, linen, machinery, &c.

ZLATOUST (21), a Russian town near the Urals, 130 m. NE. of Ufa,
with iron and gold mines near; manufactures sword-blades and other steel
ware.

ZOAR, a small village of Ohio, U.S., 91 m. S. of Cleveland, and the
seat of a German Socialistic community.

ZOeCKLER, OTTO, German theologian, professor at Greifswald; edited a
"Handbuch der theologischen Wissenschaft," and other works; _b_. 1833.

ZODIAC, the name given to a belt of the heavens extending 8 deg. on each
side of the ecliptic, composed of twelve constellations called signs of
the zodiac, which the sun traverses in the course of a year. These signs,
of which six are on the N. of the ecliptic and six on the S., are,
commencing with the former, named successively: Aries, the Ram; Taurus,
the Bull; Gemini, the Twins; Cancer, the Crab; Leo, the Lion; Virgo, the
Virgin; Libra, the Balance; Scorpio, the Scorpion; Sagittarius, the
Archer; Capricornus, the Goat; Aquarius, the Water-bearer; and Pisces,
the Fishes. The sun enters Aries at the spring equinox and Libra at the
autumnal equinox, while the first point of Cancer mar