Zeuss was born in Bavaria in July 1806, and after a brilliant school career, he went to the University of Munich, as his friends intended that he should be a clergyman. But the youth preferred linguistic studies, for which it soon transpired that he had a unique genius; and, college life over, he taught for seven years (from 1832–39) in the Gymnasium of Munich. Meantime he pursued his own favourite science, publishing in 1837 a work which is still authoritative. It dealt with the German chiefly, but from the first his studies included the oriental languages. To settle in Berlin and support himself by teaching there had now become the objective of his desire, as the Metropolis would furnish him with exceptional opportunities, but being a Catholic, he found this impossible. In 1839, however, he succeeded in getting a professorship in the Lyceum in Spires, and went there from Munich. It was then he began to study Celtic. How enormous the difficulties were for a man in his position one can readily imagine, when it is remembered how widely dispersed, unknown, and unintelligible the materials for the most part were at that time. His income was small, but in order to economise his resources, and have the wherewithal to pursue his researches, it is said that he decided to remain a bachelor. It was his custom annually during the vacation to visit the great libraries of London, Oxford, Würzburg, St. Gall, and Milan for the perusal of the Gaelic documents. In the preface to his great work, he even apologises for not having made full use of the Milan glosses. This we know was not altogether his fault, for he went twice there to study the MS. On the first occasion there happened to be a convention of savants in the city, and the library was closed, much to his disappointment. An epidemic of fever prevailed when he returned the second time, and feeling certain sensations, he imagined he had caught the infection, and left the place without accomplishing the object of his visit. No doubt the overwrought student was nervous on that occasion, and his fears may have got the better of him.