LEAF FROM BLOCK BOOK, FIFTEENTH CENTURY
The Biblia Pauperum, or the Bible for the Poor, is one of the most interesting examples among the block books. It is composed almost entirely of crude illustrations with doses of text or short explanations and sayings of the Prophets above and below the pictures, much in the manner of the tabloids of our own time. No attempt was made to reproduce the whole Bible or even a complete chapter. It was the portions familiarly known to the people which were set down. Thus the story of St. John—“Apocalypsis S. Joannis”—was one of the favorite subjects, as was Solomon’s “Song of Songs.”
Block books are, of course, among the most desirable and the most difficult to obtain of all the treasures of the bibliophile. Even a single sheet torn from a block book is valuable. I recall vividly, when in England many years ago, my first visit to an old library which contained four perfect block books, all in magnificent condition. The margins were uncut and, in fact, they appeared to be exactly the same as when they left the hands of the unknown printer in the fifteenth century. Year after year I returned to this library especially to see them. Imagine my satisfaction and joy when I was finally rewarded by the owner, who had decided to part with them.
There are only three great collections of block books in this country. One may be seen at the New York Public Library; another, also in New York, in the library founded by the late J. Pierpont Morgan; and the third in the Huntington Library in California.
The very first type-printed book with illustrations was a Latin edition of the Biblia Pauperum, printed by Albrecht Pfister, of Bamberg, in 1461. There are only two copies known: one in the John Rylands Memorial Library at Manchester, England; the other in the French National Library at Paris.
Savonarola, the Billy Sunday of his day, was quick to see the appeal of block books. He had his own sermons printed and illustrated with woodblock-printed pictures, which he distributed among his followers. It was he who drew the masses to religion at the time when Florentine art was almost at its peak. He converted Botticelli, caused him to destroy all the sensuous secular pictures he painted previous to his conversion, but happily made up for his loss by inspiring him to paint religious subjects. What would I not give to possess the charred remains of the Bible to which Savonarola clung when he died!
There is perhaps a greater lack of knowledge concerning old Bibles than of any other subject pertaining to books. To make matters worse, most people believe they have accumulated many worthwhile facts when all they pick up is some chance misinformation. At least thirty per cent of the 30,000 letters I receive annually are about Bibles or other religious works, which, according to my correspondents, “have always been in the family.” The largest number of letters come from Germany. But among people of all nationalities the hoary idea still prevails that age adds value to a Bible. Some people who are not interested in any book, old or otherwise, become excited the moment they find a Bible more than fifty years old. Clasping it to the family bosom, they often rush to my library, either in New York or Philadelphia, buoyed up by an inflated notion of their treasure’s value, believing they have sighted a rainbow with a pot of real gold at the end.
Almost everyone in the world owns or has owned a Bible. It is the one work which has been translated into every language; it is the world’s best seller, and because of this, edition after edition has appeared in every country. No one knows how many millions of pounds the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge have received to date in the revenue which has always flowed into their coffers as a perquisite on printed Bibles. The Bible rests beside one’s bed to-day in hotel rooms throughout the country. The Gideons’ Bible is the only volume the stealing of which is considered a virtue instead of a crime! The Bible is a book which has touched the hearts of us all at one time or another. When it does not appeal as a religious work its fascination is felt in the inexhaustible fund of stories and anecdotes which have never been matched by the contents of any secular book ever written. Such tales as those of Joseph and his brethren, David and Goliath, Solomon and the two mothers, will never be excelled.
A very old Bible is valuable because of its age only if it was printed between the time of the Gutenberg edition, 1455, and the year 1476. Although there were hundreds of editions of the Bible issued in Europe before 1500, only a small portion of them may be considered very valuable to-day. After 1476 Bibles must show certain characteristics to make them sufficiently desirable to the collector’s roving eye. It goes almost without saying that all first editions are worth something.
The first Bible printed in Italy, in France, or in Spain—these are all of great value and rarity as well. The first Bible printed in one of the secular languages, in the old days known as the vulgar tongues, for instance, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Icelandic, Swedish, Slavonic, Bohemian, or Basque, these, too, are valuable. Others are the first printed Bible of Strasburg, issued by Mentelin before 1460; another printed by Eggestyn in 1466; the celebrated R Bible, probably published by Adolf Rusch in 1467 at Strasburg; the Great Bible, a most beautiful specimen of printing, by Sweynheym and Pannartz, 1471; and the Great French Bible, made, oddly enough, in Paris five years later by three Germans: Gering, Kranz, and Friburger. Hebrew being the original language of the Old Testament Scriptures, it is only natural that the first printed in the Hebrew language—Soncino 1488—should be one of the cornerstones of any collection of Bibles.