Gutenberg Bible

The Gutenberg Bible, also known as the 42-line Bible, the Mazarin Bible or the B42, was the earliest major book printed in Europe using mass-produced metal movable type. It marked the start of the "Gutenberg Revolution" and the age of printed books in the West. The book is valued and revered for its high aesthetic and artistic qualities^[1] and its historical significance.

Gutenberg Bible of the New York Public Library; purchased by James Lenox in 1847, it was the first Gutenberg Bible to be acquired by a United States citizen.

The Gutenberg Bible is an edition of the Latin Vulgate printed in the 1450s by Johannes Gutenberg in Mainz, in present-day Germany. Forty-nine copies (or substantial portions of copies) have survived. They are thought to be among the world's most valuable books, although no complete copy has been sold since 1978.^[2][3] In March 1455, the future Pope Pius II wrote that he had seen pages from the Gutenberg Bible displayed in Frankfurt to promote the edition, and that either 158 or 180 copies had been printed.

The 36-line Bible, said to be the second printed Bible, is also sometimes referred to as a Gutenberg Bible, but may be the work of another printer.

Text

 

Gutenberg Bible in the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut

The Gutenberg Bible, an edition of the Vulgate, contains the Latin version of the Hebrew Old Testament and the Greek New Testament. It is mainly the work of St Jerome who began his work on the translation in AD 380, with emendations from the Parisian Bible tradition, and further divergences.^[4]

Printing history

While it is unlikely that any of Gutenberg's early publications would bear his name, the initial expense of press equipment and materials and of the work to be done before the Bible was ready for sale suggests that he may have started with more lucrative texts, including several religious documents, a German poem, and some editions of Aelius Donatus's Ars Minor, a popular Latin grammar school book.^[5][6][7]

Preparation of the Bible probably began soon after 1450, and the first finished copies were available in 1454 or 1455.^[8] It is not known exactly how long the Bible took to print. The first precisely datable printing is Gutenberg's 31-line Indulgence which certainly existed by 22 October 1454.^[9]

Gutenberg made three significant changes during the printing process.^[10]

 

Spine of the Lenox copy

Some time later, after more sheets had been printed, the number of lines per page was increased from 40 to 42, presumably to save paper. Therefore, pages 1 to 9 and pages 256 to 265, presumably the first ones printed, have 40 lines each. Page 10 has 41, and from there on the 42 lines appear. The increase in line number was achieved by decreasing the interline spacing, rather than increasing the printed area of the page. Finally, the print run was increased, necessitating resetting those pages which had already been printed. The new sheets were all reset to 42 lines per page. Consequently, there are two distinct settings in folios 1–32 and 129–158 of volume I and folios 1–16 and 162 of volume II.^[10][11]

The most reliable information about the Bible's date comes from a letter. In March 1455, the future Pope Pius II wrote that he had seen pages from the Gutenberg Bible, being displayed to promote the edition, in Frankfurt.^[12] It is not known how many copies were printed, with the 1455 letter citing sources for both 158 and 180 copies. Scholars today think that examination of surviving copies suggests that somewhere between 160 and 185 copies were printed, with about three-quarters on paper and the others on vellum.^[13][14]

The production process: Das Werk der Bücher

 

A vellum copy of the Gutenberg Bible owned by the U.S. Library of Congress, on display at the Thomas Jefferson Building in Washington, D.C.

In a legal paper, written after completion of the Bible, Johannes Gutenberg refers to the process as Das Werk der Bücher ("the work of the books"). He had introduced the printing press to Europe and created the technology to make printing with movable types finally efficient enough to facilitate the mass production of entire books.^[15]

Many book-lovers have commented on the high standards achieved in the production of the Gutenberg Bible, some describing it as one of the most beautiful books ever printed. The quality of both the ink and other materials and the printing itself have been noted.^[1]

Pages

 

First page of the first volume: the epistle of St Jerome to Paulinus from the University of Texas copy. The page has 40 lines.

The paper size is 'double folio', with two pages printed on each side (four pages per sheet). After printing the paper was folded once to the size of a single page. Typically, five of these folded sheets (ten leaves, or twenty printed pages) were combined to a single physical section, called a quinternion, that could then be bound into a book. Some sections, however, had as few as four leaves or as many as twelve leaves.^[16]

 

Gutenberg Bible on display at the U.S. Library of Congress

The 42-line Bible was printed on the size of paper known as 'Royal'.^[17] A full sheet of Royal paper measures 42 cm × 60 cm (17 in × 24 in) and a single untrimmed folio leaf measures 42 cm × 30 cm (17 in × 12 in).^[18] There have been attempts to claim that the book was printed on larger paper measuring 44.5 cm × 30.7 cm (17.5 in × 12.1 in),^[19] but this assertion is contradicted by the dimensions of existing copies. For example, the leaves of the copy in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, measure 40 cm × 28.6 cm (15.7 in × 11.3 in).^[20] This is typical of other folio Bibles printed on Royal paper in the fifteenth century.^[21] Most fifteenth-century printing papers have a width-to-height ratio of 1:1.4 (e.g. 30:42 cm) which, mathematically, is a ratio of 1 to the square root of 2 or, simply, ${\textstyle {\sqrt {2}}}$ . Many suggest that this ratio was chosen to match the so-called Golden Ratio, ${\textstyle {\tfrac {1+{\sqrt {5}}}{2}}}$ , of 1:1.6; in fact the ratios are, plainly, not at all similar (equating to a difference of about 12 per cent). The ratio of 1:1.4 was a long established one for medieval paper sizes.^[22] A single complete copy of the Gutenberg Bible has 1,288 pages (4×322 = 1288) (usually bound in two volumes); with four pages per folio-sheet, 322 sheets of paper are required per copy.^[23] The Bible's paper consists of linen fibers and is thought to have been imported from Caselle in Piedmont, Italy based on the watermarks present throughout the volume.^[24]

Ink

In Gutenberg's time, inks used by scribes to produce manuscripts were water-based. Gutenberg developed an oil-based ink that would better adhere to his metal type. His ink was primarily carbon, but also had a high metallic content, with copper, lead, and titanium predominating.^[25] Head of collections at the British Library, Kristian Jensen, described it thus: "if you look [at the pages of The Gutenberg Bible] closely you will see this is a very shiny surface. When you write you use a water-based ink, you put your pen into it and it runs off. Now if you print that's exactly what you don't want. One of Gutenberg's inventions was an ink which wasn't ink, it's a varnish. So what we call printer's ink is actually a varnish, and that means it sticks to its surface."^[26][27]

Type

Each unique character requires a piece of master type in order to be replicated. Given that each letter has uppercase and lowercase forms, and the number of various punctuation marks and ligatures (e.g., "fi" for the letter sequence "fi", commonly used in writing), the Gutenberg Bible needed a set of 290 master characters. It seems probable that six pages, containing 15,600 characters altogether, would be set at any one moment.^[5]

Type style

The Gutenberg Bible is printed in the blackletter type styles that would become known as Textualis (Textura) and Schwabacher. The name Textura refers to the texture of the printed page: straight vertical strokes combined with horizontal lines, giving the impression of a woven structure. Gutenberg already used the technique of justification, that is, creating a vertical, not indented, alignment at the left and right-hand sides of the column. To do this, he used various methods, including using characters of narrower widths, adding extra spaces around punctuation, and varying the widths of spaces around words.^[28][29]

Rubrication, illumination and binding

 

Detail showing both rubrication and illumination

Initially the rubrics—the headings before each book of the Bible—were printed, but this practice was quickly abandoned at an unknown date, and gaps were left for rubrication to be added by hand. A guide of the text to be added to each page, printed for use by rubricators, survives.^[30]

The spacious margin allowed illuminated decoration to be added by hand. The amount of decoration presumably depended on how much each buyer could or would pay. Some copies were never decorated.^[31] The place of decoration can be known or inferred for about 30 of the surviving copies. It is possible that 13 of these copies received their decoration in Mainz, but others were worked on as far away as London.^[32] The vellum Bibles were more expensive, and perhaps for this reason tend to be more highly decorated, although the vellum copy in the British Library is completely undecorated.^[33]

There has been speculation that the "Master of the Playing Cards", an unidentified engraver who has been called "the first personality in the history of engraving,"^[34] was partly responsible for the illumination of the copy held by the Princeton University library. However, all that can be said for certain is that the same model book was used for some of the illustrations in this copy and for some of the Master's illustrated playing cards.^[35]

Although many Gutenberg Bibles have been rebound over the years, nine copies retain fifteenth-century bindings. Most of these copies were bound in either Mainz or Erfurt.^[32] Most copies were divided into two volumes, the first volume ending with The Book of Psalms. Copies on vellum were heavier and for this reason were sometimes bound in three or four volumes.^[1]

Early owners

 

Binding of the copy at the Bavarian State Library, one of the few Gutenberg Bibles to retain their origial bindings.

The Bible seems to have sold out immediately, with some initial purchases as far away as England and possibly Sweden and Hungary.^[1][36] At least some copies are known to have sold for 30 florins (equivalent to about 100 grams or 3.5 ounces of gold), which was about three years' wages for a clerk.^[37][38] Although this made them significantly cheaper than manuscript Bibles, most students, priests or other people of moderate income would not have been able to afford them. It is assumed that most were sold to monasteries, universities and particularly wealthy individuals.^[30] At present only one copy is known to have been privately owned in the fifteenth century. Some are known to have been used for communal readings in monastery refectories; others may have been for display rather than use, and a few were certainly used for study.^[1] Kristian Jensen suggests that many copies were bought by wealthy and pious laymen for donation to religious institutions.^[33]

Influence on later Bibles

 

Fragment of the Gutenberg Bible that was used as Binding waste, now held by the Basel University Library.

The Gutenberg Bible had a profound effect on the history of the printed book. Textually, it also had an influence on future editions of the Bible. It provided the model for several later editions, including the 36 Line Bible, Mentelin's Latin Bible, and the first and third Eggestein Bibles. The third Eggestein Bible was set from the copy of the Gutenberg Bible now in Cambridge University Library. The Gutenberg Bible also had an influence on the Clementine edition of the Vulgate commissioned by the Papacy in the late sixteenth century.^[39][40]

Forgeries

 

Fragment of the Gutenberg Bible that was used as Binding waste, now held by the Basel University Library.

Joseph Martini, a New York book dealer, found that the Gutenberg Bible held by the library of the General Theological Seminary in New York had a forged leaf, carrying part of Chapter 14, all of Chapter 15, and part of Chapter 16 of the Book of Ezekiel. It was impossible to tell when the leaf had been inserted into the volume. It was replaced in the fall of 1953, when a patron donated the corresponding leaf from a defective Gutenberg second volume which was being broken up and sold in parts.^[41] This made it "the first imperfect Gutenberg Bible ever restored to completeness."^[41] In 1978, this copy was sold for US$2.2 million to the Württembergische Landesbibliothek in Stuttgart, Germany.^[42]

Surviving copies

 

Locations of known complete Gutenberg Bibles

As of 2009^[update], 49 Gutenberg Bibles are known to exist, but of these only 21 are complete. Others have pages or even whole volumes missing. In addition, there are a substantial number of fragments, some as small as individual leaves, which are likely to represent about another 16 copies. Many of these fragments have survived because they were used as part of the binding of later books.^[36]

Substantially complete copies

List of substantially complete copies

Country Holding institution Hubay no.^[43]^[44] Length Material Notes and external links Austria (1) Austrian National Library, Vienna 27 complete paper One of only two copies to contain the "tabula rubricarum" (index of rubrics) on four leaves at the end. Obtained from Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal in 1793.^[45]^[46]^[47] Online images (in German) Belgium (1) Library of the University of Mons-Hainaut, Mons 1 incomplete paper Vol. I, 104 leaves missing,^[48] bequeathed by Edmond Puissant to the city of Mons in 1934, but not identified until 1950.^[49] Part of the same copy as the volume in Indiana (see below).^[13] Denmark (1) Danish Royal Library, Copenhagen 13 incomplete paper Vol. II, first leaf missing. Acquired in 1749.^[50]^[51] France (4) Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris 15 complete vellum Sold to the library in 1788 by Cardinal Étienne Charles de Loménie de Brienne,^[52] and rebound in four volumes.^[53] Online images of vol. 1 vol. 2 vol. 3 vol. 4 17 incomplete paper Is distinguished by being inscribed with the earliest date that appears on any copy — 24 August 1456 on the first volume and 15 August 1456 on the second volume, the dates on which the rubricator and binder (Henricus Cremer) completed his work.^[54]^[55] Online images of vol. 1 Bibliothèque Mazarine, Paris 16 complete paper The first copy to be discovered around 1760 in the Bibliothèque Mazarine (hence the name Mazarin Bible) by Guillaume-François Debure and described in the first volume of his Bibliographie instructive: ou Traite de la connoissance des livres rares et singuliers devoted to theology, which was published in Paris in 1763.^[56]^[57]^[58] Online images of vol. 1 and vol. 2 (in French) Bibliothèque Municipale, Saint-Omer 18 incomplete paper Vol. I, one missing leaf. Acquired from the Abbey of Saint Bertin.^[59] Online images (in French) Germany (13) Gutenberg Museum, Mainz 8 incomplete paper The Shuckburgh copy, two volumes but imperfect, sold by Hans P. Kraus for $1.8 million in March 1978.^[60]^[61] Online images (in German) 9 incomplete paper Vol. II, the Solms-Laubach copy acquired in 1925.^[62]^[63] Hochschul- und Landesbibliothek Fulda [de], Fulda 4 incomplete vellum Vol. I. Two individual leaves from Vol. II survive in other libraries.^[36] Leipzig University Library, Leipzig 14 incomplete vellum Vol. I through IV. Göttingen State and University Library, Göttingen 2 complete vellum Registered in Unesco's Memory of the World Programme since 2001.^[64] Online images Berlin State Library, Berlin 3 incomplete vellum Online images Bavarian State Library, Munich 5 complete paper One of only two copies to contain the "tabula rubricarum" (index of rubrics) on four leaves at the end. Also one of three existing copies in its original binding.^[46]^[47] Online images of vol. 1 and vol. 2 (in German) Frankfurt University Library, Frankfurt am Main 6 complete paper Online images Hofbibliothek, Aschaffenburg 7 incomplete paper Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Stuttgart 10 incomplete^[65] paper Purchased in April 1978 for US$2.2 million from the General Theological Seminary. Online images Stadtbibliothek, Trier 11 incomplete paper Vol. I Landesbibliothek, Kassel 12 incomplete paper Vol. I Gottorf Castle, Schleswig 47 incomplete paper The Rendsburg Fragment^[13]^[66] Japan (1) Keio University Library, Tokyo 45^[67] incomplete paper Originally part of the Estelle Doheny bequest to St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, California. Vol. I, sold in October 1987 to Maruzen booksellers for US$4.9 million (plus an auction house commission of $490,000) for a total of $5.4 million.^[68] Purchased by Keio University in 1996.^[69] Poland (1) Diocesan Museum in Pelplin 28 incomplete paper It has a blot on page 46 and it lacks a page 217 in Volume Two. Portugal (1) Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, Lisbon 29 complete paper Formerly owned by Cardinal Étienne Charles de Loménie de Brienne. Online images. Russia (2) Moscow State University, Moscow 49 complete paper Looted in 1945 from the library of the University of Leipzig.^[70]^[71] Russian State Library, Moscow 48 incomplete vellum Acquired in 1886 by the German Museum of Books and Writing, Leipzig, as part of the book collection of Heinrich Klemm [de].^[72]^[73] At the end of World War II, it was taken as war booty and transferred to the Russian State Library in Moscow, where it remains today.^[74] Spain (2) Biblioteca Universitaria y Provincial, Seville 32 incomplete paper New Testament only Online images (in Spanish) Biblioteca Pública Provincial, Burgos 31 complete paper Online images Switzerland (1) Bodmer Library, Cologny 30 incomplete paper United Kingdom (8) British Library, London 19 complete vellum The Grenville copy.^[75]^[76] Bought for 6260 francs in 1817 by Thomas Grenville, who bequeathed his collection to the British Museum in 1846.^[77] Online images 4 November 2016 at the Wayback Machine 21 complete paper Online images 4 November 2016 at the Wayback Machine National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh 26 complete paper Online images Lambeth Palace Library, London 20 incomplete vellum New Testament only Eton College Library, Eton College 23 complete paper Printed in Mainz with the original 15th Century Erfurt binding, stamped calfskin, signed by Johannes Vogel. Donated by John Fuller (1757–1834). Belonged in the 15th century to the Carthusians at Erfurt. Only copy to retain the original binding in both volumes and is complete. Also one of three existing copies in its original binding. Also the only copy with the original binding to be signed with the binders mark. Illuminated copy, probably in Erfurt.^[78]^[79] John Rylands Library, Manchester 25 complete paper Acquired for £80 by George Spencer, 2nd Earl Spencer some time before 1814,^[80]^[81] Enriqueta Augustina Rylands bought it in 1892 for the John Rylands Library. Bodleian Library, Oxford 24^[82] complete paper Bought in 1793 for £100 from Cardinal Étienne Charles de Loménie de Brienne. Online images of vol. 1 and vol. 2 Cambridge University Library, Cambridge 22^[83] complete paper Acquired as part of a gift in 1933.^[84] Online images of vol. 1 and vol. 2 United States (11) The Morgan Library & Museum, New York 37 incomplete vellum PML 13 & PML 818. Acquired in 1815 by Mark Masterman-Sykes.^[85] 38 complete paper PML 19206–7 44 incomplete paper PML 1. Old Testament only Online images Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 35 complete vellum Online images Printed on vellum and bound in three vellum-covered volumes. On permanent display. Purchased in 1930 with government funds for the Library of Congress. It is the centerpiece of a larger book collection acquired from Dr. Otto Vollbehr. New York Public Library 42 incomplete paper Widener Library, Harvard University 40 complete paper Online images of selected pages Beinecke Library, Yale University 41 complete paper The Melk copy, a gift from Mrs. Edward Harkness in 1926.^[86]^[87] Scheide Library, Princeton University 43 incomplete paper The Brinley-Cole-Ives-Ellsworth-Scheide copy,^[88]^[89]^[90] one of three existing copies in its original binding.^[91] Online images Lilly Library, Indiana University 46^[92] incomplete paper New Testament only, 12 leaves missing.^[93] Part of the same copy as the volume in Mons, Belgium (see above).^[94] Online images Henry E. Huntington Library, San Marino, California 36 incomplete vellum Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin 39 complete paper Purchased in 1978 for US$2.4 million. Online images Vatican City (2) Vatican Library 33 incomplete vellum Online images of vol. 1 and vol. 2 34 incomplete paper Vol. I.

Recent history

 

Binding of the copy at the University of Texas at Austin

 

In 1952 the US Post Office issued a commemorative stamp celebrating the 500th anniversary of the first printing of the Bible with moveable type.The stamp depicts an image of Gutenberg showing a proof of his Bible to Aldoph of Nassau, Archbishop of Mainz.

Today, few copies remain in religious institutions, with most now owned by university libraries and other major scholarly institutions. After centuries in which all copies seem to have remained in Europe, the first Gutenberg Bible reached North America in 1847. It is now in the New York Public Library.^[95] In the last hundred years, several long-lost copies have come to light, considerably improving the understanding of how the Bible was produced and distributed.^[36]

In 1921 a New York rare book dealer, Gabriel Wells, bought a damaged paper copy, dismantled the book and sold sections and individual leaves to book collectors and libraries. The leaves were sold in a portfolio case with an essay written by A. Edward Newton, and were referred to as "Noble Fragments".^[96][97] In 1953 Charles Scribner's Sons, also book dealers in New York, dismembered a paper copy of volume II. The largest portion of this, the New Testament, is now owned by Indiana University. The leaf carrying part of Chapter 14, all of Chapter 15, and part of Chapter 16 of the Book of Ezekiel was donated to the General Theological Seminary to repair their copy of the bible (now located at the Württembergische Landesbibliothek).^[41] The matching first volume of this copy was subsequently discovered in Mons, Belgium, having been bequeathed by Edmond Puissant to the city in 1934.^[13]

The only copy held outside Europe and North America is the first volume of a Gutenberg Bible (Hubay 45) at Keio University in Tokyo. The Humanities Media Interface Project (HUMI) at Keio University is known for its high-quality digital images of Gutenberg Bibles and other rare books.^[69] Under the direction of Professor Toshiyuki Takamiya, the HUMI team has made digital reproductions of 11 sets of the bible in nine institutions, including both full-text facsimiles held in the collection of the British Library.^[98]

The last sale of a complete Gutenberg Bible took place in 1978, which sold for $2.4 million. This copy is now in Austin, Texas.^[95] The price of a complete copy today is estimated at $25−35 million.^[2][3]

A two-volume paper edition of the Gutenberg Bible was stolen from Moscow State University in 2009 and subsequently recovered in an FSB sting operation in 2013.^[99]

Possession of a Gutenberg Bible by a library has been equated to keeping a "trophy book".^[100]

See also

• Books in Germany
• Canons of page construction
• Incunable
• Jikji
• List of most expensive books and manuscripts

General bibliography

• Niels Henry Sonne. America's Oldest Episcopal Seminary Library and the Needs It Serves. New York?: General Theological Seminary, 1953.
• St. Mark's Library (General Theological Seminary). The Gutenberg Bible of the General Theological Seminary. New York: St. Mark's Library, the General Theological Seminary, 1963.
• The Gutenberg Bible of 1454, Göttingen Library, Facsimile Edition, 2 vols + booklet, ed. Stephan Füssel, 1400 pp. Taschen: Cologne. In Latin

References

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2. MSNBC:
3. Luxist.com: The World of Rare Books: The Gutenberg Bible, First and Most Valuable 2013-04-10 at the Wayback Machine
4. "The text of the Bible". bl.uk. British Library. from the original on 25 October 2016. Retrieved 6 November 2016.
5. Man, John (2002). Gutenberg: How One Man Remade the World with Words. New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc. ISBN 0-471-21823-5.
6. Klooster, John W. (2009). Icons of invention : the makers of the modern world from Gutenberg to Gates. Santa Barbara, Calif.: Greenwood Press. ISBN 978-0-313-34744-3. OCLC 647903993.
7. Gowan, Al; Meggs, Philip B.; Ashwin, Clive (1984). "A History of Graphic Design". Design Issues. 1 (1): 87. doi:10.2307/1511549. ISSN 0747-9360. JSTOR 1511549.
8. . utexas.edu. Archived from the original on 28 January 2013. Retrieved 28 March 2007.
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10. British Library, Three phases in the printing process 2011-10-14 at the Wayback Machine accessed 4 July 2009
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13. White, Eric Marshall (2002). "Long Lost Leaves from Gutenberg's Mons-Trier II Bible". Gutenberg Jahrbuch. 77: 19–36.
14. Lane Ford, Margaret (2010). "Deconstruction and Reconstruction: Detecting and Interpreting Sophisticated Copies". In Wagner, Bettina; Reed, Marcia (eds.). Early Printed Books as Material Objects: Proceedings of the Conference Organized by the Ifla Rare Books and Manuscripts Section Munich, 19–21 August 2009. De Gruyter Sur. pp. 291–304. ISBN 978-3-11-025324-5.
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22. Neil Harris, 'The Shape of Paper', subsection 'Sheet-size and the Bologna Stone', in: Paper and Watermarks as Bibliographical Evidence, Lyon, Institut d'histoire du livre, 2017, http://ihl.enssib.fr/en/paper-and-watermarks-as-bibliographical-evidence 2018-08-26 at the Wayback Machine.
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34. Shestack, Alan (1967). Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. LCCN 67029080.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
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36. White, Eric Marshall (2010). "The Gutenberg Bibles that Survive as Binder's Waste". In Wagner, Bettina; Reed, Marcia (eds.). Early Printed Books as Material Objects: Proceedings of the Conference Organized by the Ifla Rare Books and Manuscripts Section Munich, 19–21 August 2009. De Gruyter Sur. pp. 21–35. ISBN 978-3-11-025324-5.
37. McGrath, Alister (2001). In the Beginning: The Story of the King James Bible and How It Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture. Anchor Books. p. 15. ISBN 0-385-72216-8.
38. Cormack, Lesley B.; Ede, Andrew (2004). A History of Science in Society: From Philosophy to Utility. Broadview Press. pp. 95. ISBN 1-55111-332-5.
39. Needham, Paul (1999). "The Changing Shape of the Vulgate Bible in Fifteenth-Century Printing Shops". In Saenger, Paul; Van Kampen, Kimberly (eds.). The Bible as Book:the First Printed Editions. British Library. pp. 53–70. ISBN 0-7123-4601-5.
40. Needham, Paul (2010). "Copy Specifics in the Printing Shop". In Wagner, Bettina; Reed, Marcia (eds.). Early Printed Books as Material Objects: Proceedings of the Conference Organized by the Ifla Rare Books and Manuscripts Section Munich, 19–21 August 2009. De Gruyter Sur. pp. 9–20. ISBN 978-3-11-025324-5.
41. St. Mark's Library (General Theological Seminary). The Gutenberg Bible of the General Theological Seminary. New York: St. Mark's Library, the General Theological Seminary, 1963.
42. "Gutenberg Bible Census". from the original on 8 July 2011. Retrieved 1 June 2007.
43. Estelle Betzold Doheny (1987). The Estelle Doheny Collection: Fifteenth-century books, including the Gutenberg Bible. Vol. 1. Christie, Manson & Woods International. pp. 23–.
44. "ISTC (Incunabula Shorttitle Catalogue)". AMPLE. Consortium of European Research Libraries. 5 June 2018. from the original on 5 June 2018. Retrieved 5 June 2018.
45. Das Antiquariat ... (in German). Vol. 7. W. Krieg. 1951. pp. 122–. Das Exemplar enthält das älteste festgestellte Da*tum, das im Zusammenhang mit der Gutenberg*Bibel steht. ... Mit der „tabula rubricarum", auf 4 Blättern am Schluß des Werkes gedruckt. ... Das Exemplar gehörte früher Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal, dem Kurfürsten von Mainz, dessen Bibliothek 1793 aufgeteilt wurde.
46. Bettina Wagner; Marcia Reed (2010). Early Printed Books as Material Objects: Proceedings of the Conference Organized by the IFLA Rare Books and Manuscripts Section Munich, 19–21 August 2009. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 15–. ISBN 978-3-11-025530-0. As has been known for decades, the Gutenberg Bible shop printed not just the Bible itself, but also a separate rubric guide ... Gutenberg Bible at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich, and at the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna.
47. The AB Bookman's Yearbook. Bookman's weekly. 1956. p. 392. This copy contains the earliest recorded date associated with the Gutenberg Bible. At the end of both volumes are notes ... With the "tabula rubricarum" (index of rubrics) printed on 4 leaves at the end. These additional leaves occur in only one ...
48. Antiquarian Bookman. 14–26. Vol. 18. R.R. Bowker. 1956. pp. 1410–. The example of the Gutenberg Bible in Mons is quite incomplete, containing only 220 leaves of Volume I. Folio 1 is ... end of the Book of Ruth (folio 128 verso) and chapter 5 of Kings II (folio 149 recto) These comprise the 104 missing leaves.
49. Josef Stummvoll (1971). Die Gutenberg-Bibel (in German). Österreichisches Institut für Bibliotheksforschung. pp. 26–. ...Kanonikus Edmond Puissant in Mons. 1934 beim Tode Puissants an die Stadt Mons gekommen. Wurde erst 1950 vom Bibliothekar Dr. M. A. Arnould identifiziert. Nur bei Norman (20) und Stöwesand (14) verzeichnet. Aufbewahrt in der ...
50. Kongelige Bibliotek (Denmark); Harald Ilsøe (1993). On parchment, paper and palm leaves – treasures of the Royal Library, Denmark : a presentation in pictures and words on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the opening of the library to the public. Royal Library. pp. 30–. ISBN 978-87-7023-621-8. Then, in 1713, Gottorp was captured during the war with Danmark and the library made the property of the Danish king. At that ... was volume 2 of the famous 42-line Bible, Johan Gutenberg's first great work of the art of printing done at Mainz c. ...
51. Harald Ilsøe (1999). Det kongelige Bibliotek i støbeskeen: studier og samlinger til bestandens historie indtil ca. 1780 (in Danish). Museum Tusculanum Press. pp. 65–. ISBN 978-87-7289-550-5. Med et eksemplar af bind 2 af Gutenberg-biblen trykt i Mainz ca. ... af bøger til forsendelse trak ud, blev biblioteket først endeligt modtaget i København 1749.
52. Veröffentlichung der Gutenberg-gesellschaft (in French). Vol. 5–9. 1908. pp. 58–. Cédé en 1767 par les Bénédictins de Mayence à Dom Maugérard, pour Dupré de Geneste, Administrateur des Domaines à Meç, dont la bibliothèque fut vendue en 1788 par le cardinal Loménie de Brienne à la Bibliothèque ...
53. AB Bookman's Yearbook. Bookman's weekly. 1956. pp. 391–. It is hoped these emendations will bring this revision of the Gutenberg Bible list totally up to date. The compiler ... In 1788 or shortly afterwards, it was rebound in red morocco, with the arms of Louis XVI stamped in gilt on the covers, in 4 vols.
54. Das Antiquariat ... (in German). Vol. 7. W. Krieg. 1951. pp. 122–. Am Schlüsse der beiden Bände sind Vermerke des Rubrikators und Buchbinders Henricus Cremer über die Voll*endung seiner Arbeit eingetragen: (Bd. I ... 24. August 1456; Bd. II . . . 15. August 1456).
55. Howard, Nicole (2005). The Book: The Life Story Of A Technology. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 31. ISBN 978-0-313-33028-5. Retrieved 23 August 2012.
56. Frederick Richmond Goff (1971). The permanence of Johann Gutenberg. Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin; distributed by University of Texas Press. pp. 18–. ISBN 9780292700598.
57. Harold Rabinowitz; Rob Kaplan (2007). A Passion for Books: A Book Lover's Treasury of Stories, Essays, Humor, Lore, and Lists on Collecting, Reading, Borrowing, Lending, Caring for, and Appreciating Books. Crown/Archetype. pp. 229–. ISBN 978-0-307-41966-8. The story of the resurrection of the Gutenberg Bible, after Francois Guillaume de Bure recognized its importance when he came upon a copy in 1763 in the Mazarin library, is however not a part of the history of the Bible in English and must ...
58. Talbot Wilson Chambers; Frank Hugh Foster (1890). Concise Dictionary of Religious Knowledge: Biblical, Doctrinal, Historical, and Practical. Christian Literature Company. pp. 553–. Mazarin Bible, The, or Gutenberg Bible, Mentz, 1450–55, the first book printed with movable types. It was discovered by De Burc in the Mazarin Library at Paris about 1760. Six copies on vellum are known and 81 on paper. One of the latter is in ...
59. Alexandre Saint-Léger (1984). Revue du Nord. 261–263 (in French). Vol. 66. pp. 637–. Nous ne saurions bien évidemment passer sous silence un volume de la Bible à 42 lignes de Gutenberg, conservé à Saint-Omer et venant de l'abbaye de Saint-Bertin '3, mais le catalogue relève également les éditions de Pierre Schoeffer à ...
60. The Living Church. Vol. 176. Morehouse-Gorham Company. January 1978. pp. 75–. A Gutenberg Bible has been sold by New York book dealer Hans P. Kraus for $1.8 million, the same price for which he bought it in 1970. ... Known as the Shuckburgh Bible, the Kraus copy was named after Sir George Shuckburgh, its 18th century owner, who ...
61. Sandra Kirshenbaum (1978). Fine Print. S. Kirshenbaum. pp. 102–. Early in March Mr. Kraus sold his Bible, known as the Shuckburgh copy, to the Gutenberg Museum of Mainz for $1,800,000, the highest price ever paid ..
62. Gutenberg-Gesellschaft (1979). Aloys Ruppel, 1882–1977: Würdigung bei der Gedächtnisfeier des Fachbereichs 16 Geschichtswissenschaft der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz und der Gutenberg-Gesellschaft am 21. Juni 1978 (in German). Verlag der Gutenberg-Gesellschaft. pp. 26–. Als wir 1925 das silberne Jubiläum des Gutenberg-Museums vorbereiteten, rief mich Ministerialrat Hassinger vom ... von Solms-Laubach wolle sein Exemplar verkaufen und habe bereits ein Angebot von einem Leipziger Antiquar erhalten.
63. "Vor ungefähr 600 Jahren wurde Gutenberg geboren. Mainz ehrt ihn auf verschiedene Weisen: Heute für Stielaugen". Berliner Zeitung. 18 April 2000. Retrieved 5 March 2016.
64. "42-line Gutenberg Bible, printed on vellum, and its contemporary documentary background". UNESCO. from the original on 30 November 2022. Retrieved 30 November 2022.
65. While this Gutenberg Bible copy is technically complete, the leaf carrying part of Chapter 14, all of Chapter 15, and part of Chapter 16 of the Book of Ezekiel is not original to this copy. It was inserted in 1953 from another Gutenberg Bible to replace a forged leaf.
66. White, Eric Marshall; Rosenstein, Natalee; Travis, Trysh; Adams, Peter W.; Baensch, Robert E. (2003). "Book reviews". Publishing Research Quarterly. 19 (2): 65–72. doi:10.1007/s12109-003-0009-3. ISSN 1053-8801. S2CID 189906589.
67. Davis, Margaret Leslie (2019). The Lost Gutenberg: The Astounding Story of One Book's Five-Hundred-Year Odyssey. New York: TarcherPerigee. ISBN 9781592408672.
68. "Ellensburg Daily Record – Google News Archive Search". google.com. from the original on 15 April 2021. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
69. "Gutenberg Bible: The HUMI Project". The Morgan Library and Museum. 4 November 2013. from the original on 4 June 2016. Retrieved 13 May 2016.
70. "Rare Gutenberg Bible Found In Russia 50 Years After War". The Seattle Times. 10 December 1993. A rare 15th-century Gutenberg Bible that was among the treasures the Red army brought back as trophies from World War II was hidden so well in Russia's State Library that even the curator didn't know it was there. The Bible belonged to a museum in Germany, and was brought to Moscow in 1945 with other manuscripts and rare books, the newspaper Izvestia quoted the library director, Igor Filippov, as saying. [...] Russian authorities have agreed to negotiate their return.
71. Popova, Anna (22 April 2021). "8 major cultural trophies the USSR took home after WWII". Russia Beyond. Retrieved 18 January 2024. Two Bibles printed by Johannes Gutenberg from the German Museum of Books and Writing in Leipzig also ended up in Moscow. Of 180 copies, only 47 have survived to our time, so one can imagine how rare these editions are. One of the Bibles is currently kept at Moscow Lomonosov University (MGU) and the other, as it emerged only in the 1990s, is at the 'Leninka' (the Russian State Library, formerly the Lenin Library) in Moscow.
72. "German Museum of Books and Writing "Signs – Books – Networks"". from the original on 21 April 2016. Retrieved 10 April 2016.
73. Georg Jäger (2010). Geschichte des deutschen Buchhandels im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Band 1: Das Kaiserreich 1871–1918 (in German). Walter de Gruyter. pp. 218–. ISBN 978-3-11-023238-7.
74. Becker, Peter von (22 March 2012). "Buch- und Schriftkultur: Das Geisterhaus – Kultur – Tagesspiegel". Der Tagesspiegel Online (in German). from the original on 22 April 2016. Retrieved 10 April 2016. Doch die beiden Pergamentbände verwahrt bis heute die Russische Staatsbibliothek in Moskau, als Kriegsbeute.
75. Johann Wetter (1836). Kritische Geschichte der Erfindung der Buchdruckerkunst durch Johann Gutenberg zu Mainz, begleitet mit einer, vorhin noch nie angestellten, genauen Prüfung und gänzlichen Beseitigung der von Schöpfiin und seinen Anhängern verfochtenen Ansprüche der Stadt Strassburg, und einer neuen Untersuchung der Ansprüche der Stadt Harlem und vollständigen Widerlegung ihrei Verfechter Junius, Meerman, Koning, Dibdin, Otley und Ebert (in German). J. Wirth. pp. 520–.
76. Henry Noel Humphreys (1867). A History of the Art of Printing: From Its Invention to Its Wide-spread Development in the Middle of the 16th Century : Preceded by a Short Account of the Origin of the Alphabet and the Successive Methods of Recording Events and Multiplying Ms. Books Before the Invention of Printing. B. Quaritch. pp. 62–.
77. Donald Kerr (2006). Amassing Treasures for All Times: Sir George Grey, Colonial Bookman and Collector. Oak Knoll Press. pp. 95–. ISBN 978-1-58456-196-5.
78. . Archived from the original on 5 August 2020. Retrieved 25 April 2020.
79. "A library as old as the Bible it holds". 16 May 2017. from the original on 15 September 2020. Retrieved 25 April 2020.
80. Thomas Frognall Dibdin (1814). Bibliotheca Spenceriana; Or a Descriptive Catalogue of the Books Printed in the Fifteenth Century, and of Many Valuable First Editions in the Library of George John Earl Spencer. Vol. 1. pp. 6–.
81. Albert Charles Robinson Carter (1940). Let Me Tell You. Hutchinson & Company. pp. 202–.
82. "Bod-Inc online". from the original on 6 March 2016. Retrieved 5 March 2016.
83. "Cambridge University Library – Addendum". Addendum. 9 September 2015. from the original on 26 September 2018. Retrieved 5 March 2016.
84. Peter Fox (1998). Cambridge University Library: The Great Collections. Cambridge University Press. pp. 65–. ISBN 978-0-521-62647-7.
85. Takami Matsuda; Richard A. Linenthal; John Scahill (2004). The medieval book and a modern collector: essays in honour of Toshiyuki Takamiya. D.S. Brewer. pp. 448–. ISBN 978-4-8419-0348-5.
86. Allen Kent; Harold Lancour; Jay E. Daily (1982). Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science: Volume 33 – The Wellesley College Library to Zoological Literature: A Review. CRC Press. pp. 315–. ISBN 978-0-8247-2033-9. Perhaps the most outstanding volume in the Beinecke collection is the Melk copy of the Gutenberg Bible, the gift of Mrs. Edward S. Harkness. The Gutenberg Bible is thought to have been the first book printed with movable type and was ...
87. Christopher Morley; Ken Kalfus; Walter Jack Duncan (1990). Christopher Morley's Philadelphia. Fordham Univ Press. pp. 76–. ISBN 978-0-8232-1270-5.
88. Randolph G. Adams (1939). The Americanists. pp. 49–. This particular Bible came from Erfurt, in Germany.24 It was handled by a Berlin dealer, A. Asher, who also had a ... So Brinley got a Gutenberg Bible at ,£637-15-0, and, as Stevens said, "Cheap at the price." 25 But ... Brinley – Hamilton Cole – Brayton Ives – James W. Ellsworth – A. S. W. Rosenbach – John H. Scheide.
89. Grolier Club (1966). Gazette of the Grolier Club. pp. 116–. There were three main type groups represented in the exhibition: The type of the 42-line Bible. The type of the 36-line ... THE 4'2-LINE BIBLE This work is the masterpiece of Johann Gutenberg. Mr. Goff has ... now owned by Arthur A. Houghton Jr.; and the Brinley-Cole-Ives-Ellsworth copy, now owned by William H. Scheide.
90. The Princeton University Library Chronicle. Vol. 37–39. Friends of the Princeton University Library. 1976. pp. 77–. sold the Bible a year later for $46,000 to the late John H. Scheide, the father of the present owner. The Brinley-Cole-Ives-Ellsworth- Scheide copy was brought to Princeton from Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1959, where it had remained for 35 years. ... Hellmut Lehmann-Haupt in his Gutenberg and the Master of the Playing Cards (New Haven and London, 1966) has shown the relationship of a number of ...
91. Princeton Alumni Weekly. Vol. 61. princeton alumni weekly. 1960. pp. 86–. PRNC:32101081976894.
92. Frank P. Leslie (1960). The 46th Gutenberg. Vagabond Press.
93. The Friends of the Lilly Library Newsletter. Vol. 29–32. Indiana University Foundation. 1998. pp. 5–. The second volume of the Gutenberg Bible from which the Lilly Library New Testament would eventually be extracted was discovered in 1828 in a farmhouse ... The copy had 116 leaves of the original 128 of a full Gutenberg New Testament.
94. Lotte Hellinga; Martin Davies (1999). Incunabula: studies in fifteenth-century printed books presented to Lotte Hellinga. British Library. pp. 341–. ISBN 9780712345071.
95. Clausen Books Gutenberg Bible Census 2011-07-08 at the Wayback Machine accessed 7 July 2009
96. "Incunabula Leaf Biblia Latina (ca 1450) Gutenberg". The McCune Collection. 31 August 2014. from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 1 October 2014.
97. . Archived from the original on 1 September 2006. Retrieved 2 September 2006.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
98. Pearson, David (2006). Bowman, J (ed.). British Librarianship and Information Work 1991–2000: Rare book librarianship and historical bibliography. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Ltd. p. 178. ISBN 978-0-7546-4779-9.
99. "Russia sentences secret agents over theft of Gutenberg Bible". BBC News. 6 June 2014. from the original on 10 July 2018. Retrieved 21 June 2018.
100. Hetzer, Armin (1996). "'The Return from the States of the Former Soviet Union of Cultural Property Removed in the 1940s' as a Bibliographical Undertaking". Solanus. 10. Translated from German and Russian by Gregory Walker. ISSN 0038-0903 – via Internet Archive. The 'trophy' books fulfilled a threefold function. A part of them consisted of trophies in the stricter sense, for example the Gutenberg Bible now held in the Russian State Library (formerly the Lenin Library). Such books are not put to use for practical purposes: they are simply objects of beauty. Another part was ... [p. 17]

External links

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Gutenberg Bible.

• Gutenberg Digital Public access to digitised copy of the Gutenberg Bible held by the Göttingen State and University Library in Germany
• Morgan Gutenberg Bible Online Digitised copy of the Gutenberg Bible at the Morgan Library & Museum in the United States
• Treasures in Full: Gutenberg Bible 10 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine Information about Gutenberg and the Bible as well as online images of the British Library's two copies
• Gutenberg Bible Census Details of surviving copies, including some notes on provenance
• The Munich copy of the Gutenberg Bible on bavarikon
• Tabula rubricarum (in German) Image of rubricators' instructions from the Munich copy
• 1462 The Gutenberg Bible Latin Vulgate – via archive.org.
• The Gutenberg Bible at the Beinecke 2020-07-27 at the Wayback Machine Podcast from the Beinecke Library, Yale University
• The Gutenberg Leaf Image and information about a single "Noble Fragment" held by the McCune Collection in Vallejo, California
• History in the Headlines: 7 Things You May Not Know About the Gutenberg Bible History.com, February 23, 2015