for his intimate acquaintance with the desert. Ewald considers that he belonged to the exile in Egypt, on account of his minute acquaintance with that country. But all these conjectures localize an author whose knowledge was not confined to any locality, who was a true child of the East and familiar with life and nature in every country there, who was at the same time a true Israelite and felt that the earth was the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, and whose sympathies and thought took in all God’s works.
Literature.—Commentaries by Ewald (1854); Renan (1859); Delitzsch (1864); Zöckler in Lange’s Bibelwerk (1872); F. C. Cook in Speaker’s Comm. (1880); A. B. Davidson in Cambridge Bible (1884); Dillmann (1891); K. Budde (1896); Duhm (1897). See also Hoekstra, “Job de Knecht van Jehovah” in Theol. Tijdschr. (1871), and, in reply, A. Kuenen, “Job en de leidende Knecht van Jahveh,” ibid. (1873); C. H. H. Wright in Bib. Essays (1886); G. G. Bradley, Lects. on Job (2nd ed., 1888); Cheyne, Job and Solomon (1887); Dawson, Wisd. Lit. (1893); D. B. Macdonald, “The Original Form of the Legend of Job” in Journ. Bib. Lit. (1895); E. Hatch, Essays in Bib. Gk. (1889); A. Dillmann, in Trans. of Roy. Pruss. Acad. (1890). (A. B. D.; C. H. T.*)
JOBST, or Jodocus (c. 1350–1411), margrave of Moravia,
was a son of John Henry of Luxemburg, margrave of Moravia,
and grandson of John, the blind king of Bohemia. He became
margrave of Moravia on his father’s death in 1375, and his clever
and unscrupulous character enabled him to amass a considerable
amount of wealth, while his ambition led him into constant
quarrels with his brother Procop, his cousins, the German king
Wenceslaus and Sigismund, margrave of Brandenburg, and
others. By taking advantage of their difficulties he won considerable
power, and the record of his life is one of warfare and
treachery, followed by broken promises and transitory reconciliations.
In 1385 and 1388 he purchased Brandenburg from
Sigismund, and the duchy of Luxemburg from Wenceslaus; and
in 1397 he also became possessed of upper and lower Lusatia.
For some time he had entertained hopes of the German throne
and had negotiated with Wenceslaus and others to this end.
When, however, King Rupert died in 1410 he maintained at
first that there was no vacancy, as Wenceslaus, who had been
deposed in 1400, was still king; but changing his attitude, he
was chosen German king at Frankfort on the 1st of October
1410 in opposition to Sigismund, who had been elected a few days
previously. Jobst however was never crowned, and his death
on the 17th of January 1411 prevented hostilities between the
rival kings.
See F. M. Pelzel, Lebensgeschichte des römischen und böhmischen Königs Wenceslaus (1788–1790); J. Heidemann, Die Mark Brandenburg unter Jobst von Mähren (1881); J. Aschbach, Geschichte Kaiser Sigmunds (1838–1845); F. Palacky, Geschichte von Böhmen, iii. (1864–1874); and T. Lindner, Geschichte des Deutschen Reiches vom Ende des 14 Jahrhunderts bis zur Reformation, i. (1875–1880).
JOB’S TEARS, in botany, the popular name for Coix Lachryma-Jobi,
a species of grass, of the tribe maydeae, which also includes
the maize (see Grasses). The seeds, or properly fruits, are contained
singly in a stony involucre or bract, which does not open
until the enclosed seed germinates. The young involucre surrounds
the female flower and the stalk supporting the spike of
male flowers, and when ripe has the appearance of bluish-white
porcelain. Being shaped somewhat like a large drop of fluid, the
form has suggested the name. The fruits are esculent, but the
involucres are the part chiefly used, for making necklaces and
other ornaments. The plant is a native of India, but is now
widely spread throughout the tropical zone. It grows in marshy
places; and is cultivated in China, the fruit having a supposed
value as a diuretic and anti-phthisic. It was cultivated by John
Gerard, author of the famous Herball, at the end of the 16th
century as a tender annual.
JOCASTA, or Iocasta (Ἰοκάστη; in Homer, Ἐπικάστη), in
Greek legend, wife of Laïus, mother (afterwards wife) of Oedipus
(q.v.), daughter of Menoeceus, sister (or daughter) of Creon.
According to Homer (Od. xi. 271) and Sophocles (Oed. Tyr. 1241),
on learning that Oedipus was her son she immediately hanged
herself; but in Euripides (Phoenissae, 1455) she stabs herself
over the bodies of her sons Eteocles and Polynices, who had slain
each other in single combat before the walls of Thebes.
JOCKEY, a professional rider of race-horses, now the current
usage (see Horse-racing). The word is by origin a diminutive
of “Jock,” the Northern or Scots colloquial equivalent of the
name “John” (cf. Jack). A familiar instance of the use of the
word as a name is in “Jockey of Norfolk” in Shakespeare’s
Richard III. v. 3, 304. In the 16th and 17th centuries the word
was applied to horse-dealers, postilions, itinerant minstrels and
vagabonds, and thus frequently bore the meaning of a cunning
trickster, a “sharp,” whence “to jockey,” to outwit, or “do”
a person out of something. The current usage is found in John
Evelyn’s Diary, 1670, when it was clearly well known. George
Borrow’s attempt to derive the word from the gipsy chukni, a
heavy whip used by horse-dealing gipsies, has no foundation.
JODELLE, ÉTIENNE, seigneur de Limodin (1532–1573),
French dramatist and poet, was born in Paris of a noble family.
He attached himself to the poetic circle of the Pléiade (see
Daurat) and proceeded to apply the principles of the reformers
to dramatic composition. Jodelle aimed at creating a classical
drama that should be in every respect different from the
moralities and soties that then occupied the French stage.
His first play, Cléopâtre captive, was represented before the court
at Reims in 1552. Jodelle himself took the title rôle, and the
cast included his friends Remy Belleau and Jean de la Péruse.
In honour of the play’s success the friends organized a little
fête at Arcueil when a goat garlanded with flowers was led in
procession and presented to the author—a ceremony exaggerated
by the enemies of the Ronsardists into a renewal of the pagan
rites of the worship of Bacchus. Jodelle wrote two other plays.
Eugène, a comedy satirizing the superior clergy, had less success
than it deserved. Its preface poured scorn on Jodelle’s predecessors
in comedy, but in reality his own methods are not so
very different from theirs. Didon se sacrifiant, a tragedy which
follows Virgil’s narrative, appears never to have been represented.
Jodelle died in poverty in July 1573. His works were collected
the year after his death by Charles de la Mothe. They include
a quantity of miscellaneous verse dating chiefly from Jodelle’s
youth. The intrinsic value of his tragedies is small. Cléopâtre
is lyric rather than dramatic. Throughout the five acts of the
piece nothing actually happens. The death of Antony is announced
by his ghost in the first act; the story of Cleopatra’s
suicide is related, but not represented, in the fifth. Each act
is terminated by a chorus which moralizes on such subjects as
the inconstancy of fortune and the judgments of heaven on
human pride. But the play was the starting-point of French
classical tragedy, and was soon followed by the Médée (1553) of
Jean de la Péruse and the Aman (1561) of André de Rivaudeau.
Jodelle was a rapid worker, but idle and fond of dissipation.
His friend Ronsard said that his published poems gave no
adequate idea of his powers.
Jodelle’s works are collected (1868) in the Pléiade française of Charles Marty-Laveaux. The prefatory notice gives full information of the sources of Jodelle’s biography, and La Mothe’s criticism is reprinted in its entirety.
JODHPUR, or Marwar, a native state of India, in the
Rajputana agency. Area, 34,963 sq. m. Pop. (1901), 1,935,565,
showing a decrease of 23% in the decade, due to the results of
famine. Estimated revenue, £373,600; tribute, £14,000. The
general aspect of the country is that of a sandy plain, divided
into two unequal parts by the river Lūni, and dotted with picturesque
conical hills, attaining in places an elevation of 3000 ft.
The river Lūni is the principal feature in the physical aspects of
Jodhpur. One of its head-streams rises in the sacred lake of
Pushkar in Ajmere, and the main river flows through Jodhpur
in a south-westerly direction till it is finally lost in the marshy
ground at the head of the Runn of Cutch. It is fed by numerous
tributaries and occasionally overflows its banks, fine crops
of wheat and barley being grown on the saturated soil. Its
water is, as a rule, saline or brackish, but comparatively sweet
water is obtained from wells sunk at a distance of 20 or 30 yds.
from the river bank. The famous salt-lake of Sambhar is situated
on the borders of Jodhpur and Jaipur, and two smaller
lakes of the same description lie within the limits of the state,
