Gender Masculine
Usage Popular Culture
Meaning & History
The name of a Tarzan-inspired French comic-book character first appearing in 1963. In the series, he is the biracial son of a tropical princess named Ula and a wealthy French adventurer named Paul Marais, both of whom were killed by the former's father during his infancy. A lioness, whose cub was also killed by Ula's father, killed the antagonist and saved the child. He was raised by and among lions, and came to be known as Zembla or the Lion Child in the language of the lions. His name is perhaps a French corruption of Swahili Simba 2 or the Russian word for "land" (compare zemlja).