First a Slavic pagan settlement later Christianized, Zeitz was first recorded under the
Medieval Latin name
Cici in the
Synod of Ravenna in 967. The name
"Zeitz" is believed to have Slavic origins, likely deriving from the
Sorbian word
"cica", meaning "water" or "stream," referring to the White Elster river that flows through the town. The suffix
"-itz" is a common Slavic placename ending. Between 965 and 982, it was the chief fortress of the
March of Zeitz. Zeitz was a bishop's residence between 968 and 1028, when it was moved to
Naumburg. Beginning at the end of the 13th century, the bishops again resided in their castle at Zeitz. The city was captured by Swedish troops during the
Thirty Years' War and was given to
Electorate of Saxony in 1644. It was the centre of
Saxe-Zeitz between 1657 and 1718, before returning to the Electorate (which became the
Kingdom of Saxony in 1806). In 1815, it was given to the
Kingdom of Prussia, becoming district (kreis) centre of the Merseburg region (regierungsbezirk) of the
Province of Saxony until 1944, when it became part of the Province of
Halle-Merseburg. The Herrmannsschacht, built in 1889, is one of the oldest
brown coal briquette factories in the world. It became a county free city between 1901 and 1950. A bombing target of the
Oil Campaign of World War II, the
Brabag plant northeast of Zeitz used
lignite coal for the production of
synthetic fuels –
forced labor was provided by the nearby
Wille subcamp of
Buchenwald in Rehmsdorf and Gleina. It was occupied by U.S. troops on 27 April 1945 and was transferred to
Soviet control on 1 July 1945. It was a district centre in the Halle region of
Saxony-Anhalt state in 1945–1952 and again in 1990–1994, and in
Bezirk Halle between 1952 and 1990. It lost its status as county centre and became part of the Burgenlandkreis on 1 July 1994. In the middle of the 1960s work started on the "Zeitz-Ost" residential area, and in the mid-1980s, housing estates such as the "Völkerfreundschaft" () were built. On 18 August 1976, the Protestant clergyman
Oskar Brüsewitz from
Rippicha burnt himself to death in front of the Michaeliskirche. This was a protest against the
DDR system. The town was an industrial centre until
German Reunification made many companies in eastern Germany uncompetitive, and 20,000 people lost jobs or moved to other employment. The town still has a large sugar factory, and the nearby
lignite mines (
Profen and
Schleenhain) and
Lippendorf Power Station, together employing 2,000 people from Zeitz. On 1 July 2009 Zeitz absorbed the former municipalities
Döbris,
Geußnitz,
Kayna,
Nonnewitz and
Würchwitz. On 1 January 2010 it absorbed
Luckenau and
Theißen. == Geography ==