Žiga Zois.
, usually referred as
Sigmund Zois (
Žiga Zois in
Slovene) (23 November, 1747 – 10 November, 1819) was a
Carniolan
nobleman,
natural scientist and
patron of the arts. He is considered as one of the most influential figures of the
Enlightenment Era in the
Slovene Lands.
Early life
Sigmund's father Michelangelo Zois was a
Venetian merchant who moved to
Ljubljana where he made a considerable fortune. He married a
Carniolan noblewoman and acquired the right to the title of
baron. He owned large estates both in Carniola and on the
Kras, and Sigmund was born in
Trieste, in one of his father's palaces.
He studied natural sciences with
Gabriel Gruber and
Giuseppe Maffei in Ljubljana. After attending several other private schools, Sigmund Zois moved to
Italy where he continued his education. He enjoyed traveling and making new acquaintances. However, his way of life was soon truncated by
gout, a disease that would stuck him for the rest of his life. After returning to
Ljubljana, he developed a strong interest in sciences and started to work with
Baltazar Hacquet and several
Slovene intellectuals of the time.
The Zois circle
In the early 1780s,
his mansion in Ljubljana became a fostering center for
liberal intellectuals at the center of the Slovene
enlightenment.
Jurij Japelj,
Blaž Kumerdej,
Jernej Kopitar,
Anton Tomaž Linhart, and
Valentin Vodnik were the most prominent members of what became known as the “Zois circle”. Zois was their patron, mentoring them and granting them necessary financial support for their cultural and scientific efforts, thus becoming the central figure of the Slovenian enlightenment. He was a
deist and his views were rational and empirical. Nevertheless, he strongly opposed the
French revolution and supported the moderate enlightened constitutionalism of
Leopold II.
The literary opus of Sigmund Zois, of modest quality and little influence, includes many literary forms and genres, ranging from arias for the opera to lyrics for folk music, although probably only a minor part of his work has been preserved. His translation of the poem
Lenore by
Gottfried August Burger was regarded as a complete failure, and Zois himself later came to the conclusion that the Slovene language was "too mediocre and rough" to allow for such a literary achievement. He would be disproven only some decades later by
France Prešeren who managed to compose a complex and exceptional translation of the same poem. Zois is also regarded as a father of Slovene
literary criticism, and most of his literary reviews can be found in his correspondence with
Valentin Vodnik.
Zois died in Ljubljana.
Other achievements
Much more important are his achievements in
mineralogy,
geology,
botany, and
zoology. His collection of minerals (around 5,000 items) is kept at the Slovenian National Museum in Ljubljana.
In 1795, he mounted two expeditions to explore the land around the
Triglav mountain. In 1805, the mineral
zoisite was named after him, since Zois was the first to correctly assess that the rock found by
Simon Prešern in the
Carinthian Alps represented a previously unknown mineral.
Sigmund also supported the work of his brother, the
botanist Karl Zois who, among other things, discovered the
Campanula zoysii, a previously unknown
Carniolan flower.
The most important scientific award in Slovenia, as well as a state-founded
scholarship for talented students, are named after him.
See also
