ZĒTĒTAE (ζητηταί), _Inquisitors_, were extraordinary officers,
appointed by the Athenians to discover the authors of some crime
against the state, and bring them to justice. They were more
frequently appointed to search for confiscated property, the
goods of condemned criminals and state debtors; to receive and
give information against any persons who concealed, or assisted
in concealing them, and to deliver an inventory of all such goods
(ἀπογράφειν) to the proper authorities.
ZŌNA, also called CINGŬLUM (ζώνη, ζῶμα, ζωστῆρ, μίτρα), a girdle
or zone, worn about the loins by both sexes. The chief use of this
article of dress was to hold up the tunic (ζώννυσθαι), which was
more especially requisite to be done when persons were at work, on
a journey, or engaged in hunting. The zona is also represented in
many statues and pictures of men in armour as worn round the cuirass.
The girdle, mentioned by Homer, seems to have been a constituent
part of the cuirass, serving to fasten it by means of a buckle, and
also affording an additional protection to the body, and having a
short kind of petticoat attached to it, as is shown in the figure of
the Greek warrior in p. 240. The cut at p. 4 shows that the ancient
cuirass did not descend low enough to secure that part of the body
which was covered by the ornamental kilt or petticoat. To supply this
defect was the design of the _mitra_ (μίτρα), a brazen belt lined
probably on the inside with leather and stuffed with wool, which was
worn next to the body. Men used their girdles to hold money instead
of a purse. As the girdle was worn to hold up the garments for the
sake of business or of work requiring despatch, so it was loosened
and the tunic was allowed to fall down to the feet to indicate the
opposite condition, and more especially in preparing to perform
a sacrifice (_veste recincta_), or funeral rites (_discincti_,
_incinctae_). A girdle was worn by young women, even when their tunic
was not girt up, and removed on the day of marriage, and therefore
called ζώνη παρθενική.
ZŌPHŎRUS (ζωφόρος or διάζωμα), the frieze of an entablature.