Lot 58
  • 58

Bible in English [The Great Bible, 5th Edition]

Estimate
7,000 - 10,000 USD
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Description

  • The Byble in Englysh, that Is To Saye the Content of All the Holy Scrypture, Both of the Olde and Newe Testament with a Prologe Thereinto, Made by ... Thomas Archebyshop of Cantorbury ... [London] Printed by Edwarde Whitchurche, 28 May 1541
  • leather,ink,paper
5 parts in one volume, folio (14 1/4 x 9 7/8 in.; 361 x 251 mm). Black letter, text in 2 columns, 62 lines to a full column, general title (facsimile) and New Testament title printed in red and black within Henrican woodcut border, divisional titles to Parts 2–4 printed in red and black within a border composed of 16 various woodcuts, each part with separate register and foliation, woodcut text illustrations, several 12-line calligraphic woodcut initials, one fine 18-line woodcut initial "P" (Hh4v), and numerous others; title-page to Part 4 (Aaa1) defective costing one woodcut and part of two others at bottom, approximately 35 leaves browned, some staining costing a few words on *4, several preliminary leaves remargined or extended, with a few skillfully supplied in part with facsimile, other marginal repairs (one costing a folio number), numerous headlines shaved or cropped, colophon leaf in facsimile,. Brown morocco over beveled wooden boards, paneled in blind, inner panel roll-tooled in blind, spine in six compartments lettered gilt and tooled in blind with raised bands, vellum guards, edges gilt; bands and board edges rubbed, bookplate evidently removed from front doublure.

Provenance

acquisition: Biblical Heritage Collection Archives, Orlando, FL, 21 June 1996 (purchased from David Smith, 23 May 1996)

Literature

STC 2074; ESTC S120839; Herbert 61

Catalogue Note

The fifth Great Bible (May, 1541) and the fourth with Cranmer's Prologue. "In this ... the revision of the text appears to have been very slight. According to Francis Fry, the divisional title to the Apocrypha (Part 4, Aaa1) was supplied from the sixth edition, printed in November, 1541.

"In April 1541 Anthony Marler received permission to sell copies of the Great Bible ... And in the next month a royal proclamation announced the heavy penalties to which each parish was liable which failed to provide its church with a copy by the November following" (Herbert).