Bible. New Testament. Greek and Latin.

Estimate

8,000 - 12,000 GBP

bidding is closed

Description

Novum instrumentum omne, diligenter ab Erasmo Roterodamo recognitum & emendatum... (Annotationes Novi Testamenti). Basel: Johann Froben, (1516)

folio (290 x 199mm.), parallel text in Greek and Latin, woodcut printer's device on title-page, four-piece woodcut borders on aa[a]2, A1 and t6, headpiece and initials on a1 printed in red, woodcut initials and headpieces, eighteenth-century marbled calf, morocco lettering-piece, without blank t6, border on A1 slightly shaved at foredge, marginal paper repair in X3, s4 torn in margin without loss, last leaf slightly torn and soiled (without loss), binding worn

Provenance

Bequeathed to the Bishopric of Cornwall by the Rev. Franke Parker, M.A., Rector of Luffincott, Devon, 1883, bookplate; Truro Cathedral, bookplate

Literature

Darlow & Moule 4591

Catalogue Note

first edition of Erasmus's "New instrument", and the earliest publication of the new testament in greek. The New Testament volume of the Complutensian Polyglot (see lot 22) was printed earlier (in 1514) but published later.

"Erasmus's Greek New Testament (1516) [is one of] the outstanding monuments of Basel printing... Its fame is chiefly based on the fact that Erasmus was the first to treat critically the text of the Vulgate and that his Greek version was the source of Luther's translation (which thus perpetuated some of Erasmus's errors)" (S.H. Steinberg, Five Hundred Years of Printing, 1996, p.21). Printing was hurried through the press in order for it to appear on the market before the Complutensian Polyglot, resulting in very many textual errors, but it is still a monument to Biblical textual criticism. Erasmus was vilified after publication for what was considered to be an attack on the text of the Vulgate.