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He served for some time in the Austrian army, and afterwards lived in London from 1783 to 1786 as tutor in the house of the Saxon minister, Count Brühl. In 1786 he was appointed by Ernest II of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha director of the new observatory on the Seeberg at Gotha, which was finished in 1791Events January 25 The British Parliament passes the Constitutional Act of 1791, splitting the old province of Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada March 3 The United States Congress passes a resolution calling for the establishment of the United States Mint. At the close of the 18th century17th century 18th century 19th century more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701- 1800; however, historians will sometimes specifically refer to the 18th Century as 1715- 89,, he organised a group of 24 astronomers to prepare for a systematic search for the "missing planet" predicted by the Titius-Bode lawThe Titius-Bode law (or Bode's law is the observation that orbits of planets in the solar system closely follow a simple geometric rule. It was discovered in 1766 by Johann Daniel Titius and "published" (without attribution) in 1772 by Johann Elert Bode, between MarsMars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the solar system, named after the Roman god of war (the counterpart of the Greek Ares), on account of its blood red color as viewed in the night sky. Mars has two small moons, Phobos and Deimos, both small and odd and Jupiter. Ironically, 1 Ceres1 Ceres ("SEER eez") was the first asteroid to be discovered, with a diameter of 959. It was discovered on January 1, 1801, by Giuseppe Piazzi, and originally named Ceres Ferdinandea after both the mythological figure Ceres ( Roman goddess of plants and m was discovered by accident just as the search was getting underway. From 1806Events January 8 Cape Colony becomes a British colony January 10 Dutch in Cape Town surrender to the British January 19 The United Kingdom occupies the Cape of Good Hope March 23 After traveling through the Louisiana Purchase and reaching the Pacific Ocea Zach accompanied the duke's widow on her travels in the south of EuropeFor the band of the same name, see Europe (band . Europe is a continent forming the westermost part of the Eurasian supercontinent. Europe is bounded to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the west by the Atlantic Ocean, to the south by the Mediterranean Se. He died in Paris in 1832.
Zach published Tables of the Sun (Gotha, 1792; new and improved edition, ibid., 1804), and numerous papers on geographical subjects, particularly on the geographical positions of many towns and places, which he determined on his travels with a sextant.
His principal importance was, however, as editor of three scientific journals of great value: Allgemeine Geographische Ephemeriden (4 vols., Gotha, 1798- 1799), Monatliche Correspondent zur Beförderung der Erd- und Himmels-Kunde (28 vols., Gotha, 1800- 1813, from 1807 edited by B. von Lindenau), and Correspondance astronomique, geographique, hydrographique, et statistique ( Genoa, 1818- 1826, 14 vols., and one number of the 15th, the suppression of which was instigated by the Jesuits).
Asteroid 999 Zachia is named after him, and asteroid 64 Angelina is named after an astronomical station he set up near Marseilles.