One of the most glorious productions of the Bible is the Jenson edition, printed in Venice in 1479. I have a superb copy on vellum, with a special page of dedication to Pope Sixtus IV. All Bibles with dedications to or from noted persons immediately become significant in the estimation of the book lover.
Sometime after the printing of the Vulgate version, certain editors, shrewd enough to discern the public mind, offered a Bible complete with three versions. In the centre of the page they printed the Vulgate, while on one side a Hebrew text was printed, and on the other, a Greek.
But it is to the first English printer, William Caxton, that the honor should go for the first printed appearance of any part of the Scriptures in English. Caxton came from Kent, and in his youth went to Bruges and Cologne to learn the trade of printer. He was the first to introduce printing into England and the first to print any works in English. He was a scholar of parts, as well as a printer with fine taste, and himself translated into English many of the works which he later published. In 1483 he issued the Golden Legend, which includes lives of Adam, Abraham, Moses, and other characters of the Old and New Testaments. Thus it contains nearly all of the Pentateuch and portions of the Gospels. If this were generally known and appreciated, I feel certain the Golden Legend would approach a price more nearly like that of the Gutenberg Bible. But as the book game is one of magic and alchemy, this may happen unexpectedly any time.
Among the fourteen or fifteen Caxtons in my New York vault, I am happy to say I have a beautiful copy which contains, unmutilated, the account of the murder of Thomas A. Becket, as a friend of mine once wrote it, which has been entirely deleted from most copies.
SPECIAL DEDICATION PAGE TO SIXTUS IV, OF JENSON’S
BIBLE, VENICE, 1479
BIBLIA
SACRA
CUM PROLOCIS
S. HIERONIMI
PRESBYTERI
WOODCUT, “JUDITH AND HOLOFERNES,” FROM CAXTON’S
“GOLDEN LEGEND,” 1483
Of course almost everyone knows that the first complete Bible in the English language was the work of Miles Coverdale. He finished his translation in 1535, and it was printed that same year at Zurich. Although as a work of scholarship it may not rank particularly high,—it is “translated out of Douche and Latyn,” according to the title,—you will find many of Coverdale’s memorable and sonorous phrases preserved in the authorized version in use to-day.