[Folio. 481 leaves, 2 columns, 48 lines to the column, gothic letter, without signatures, catchwords or pagination.]
Leaves 204, 205 containing Judith xiv. 17—Esther iv. 4.
Fol. 204b, col. 1 (red): explicit liber iudith secundum ieronimum. Incipit prologus in librum hester. Col. 2 (red): Explicit prologus. Incip. liber hester. Hain *3050. Pellechet 2281. Copinger 4. Brit. Mus. 15th cent., I, p. 22. Burger pl. 74. De Ricci 79.
Five-line initial of prologue and fourteen-line initial I of Esther i. 1 supplied in colors. Heading of leaf in alternate red and blue capitals. Initial-strokes in red on text capitals. Measurement 16 1/4 × 11 1/2 in.
The fourth printed Bible, and the first in which place, printers' names and date are given. These details, which are wanting in so many of the books of the early printers, Fust and Schoeffer—and Schoeffer when he carried on the business alone—rarely failed to add to anything large enough to be called a book that came from their press. This is their fifth book and the colophon attached to the first, the famous Psalter of 1457, was repeated in them all, with no essential change beyond the date, and continued to do duty for ten years longer. In the present Bible among the typographical differences found in the copies are three varieties of the colophon, two of which however are identical in language and differ only in the printers' use of contractions and capitals. The more common of the forms affirms that: "This present work by the ingenious invention of printing or stamping letters without any scratching of the pen has been thus fashioned in the city of Mainz and to the worship of God has been diligently brought to completion by Johann Fust citizen and Peter Schoeffer clerk of the same diocese in the year of the Lord 1462, on the eve of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary."
In Seymour de Ricci's "Catalogue raisonné des premières impressions de Mayence (1445-1467)," Mainz, 1911, 61 known copies of this Bible, 36 of them on vellum, are enumerated and 41 copies which cannot now be traced. The fragment in our possession is entered (No. 115) as one leaf only, instead of two.
The second dated Bible, the eleventh in the series of printed Bibles, was that of Sweynheym and Pannartz, Rome, 1471; the third was a reprint by Schoeffer in 1472 of the present edition, page for page, line for line and in the same type.
2. JUSTINIANUS. Novellae constitutiones, sive Authenticum. Consuetudines feudorum. Codicis libri X-XII. Moguntiae, Petrus Schoeffer, 21 August, 1477.
Fol. 1a. [Text (red)]: In nomine domini nostri ihesu christi. de heredibus et falcidia constitutio prima si heres legata soluere noluerit Incipit constitutio Imperatoris Iustiniani. a. Iohanni pape secundo. [Commentary]: [I]N nomine domini. Iustinianus opus suum laudabile deo attribuit. Fol. 169b. Explicit liber autenticorum. Fol. 170a. [Text (red)]: Incipiunt consuetudines feudorum. Fol. 206a. [Text (red)]: Codicis domini iustiniani sacratissimi principis perpetui augusti repetite prelectionis incipit liber decimus. Fol. 300b, Colophon (red): Anno incarnacionis dominice .M.cccc.lxxvii. xii. kalendis septembrijs! Sanctissimo in christo patre ac domino, domino Sixto papa .iiii. pontifice maximo. Illustrissimo noblissime domus austrie domino, domino Friderico Romanorum Imperatore inuictissimo, monarchie christiane dominis! Reuerendissimo deoque amabili in Christo patre ac domino, domino Diethero archipresule Maguntino; in ciuitate Maguncia impressorie artis inuentrice atque elimatrice prima .x. collacionum triumque librorum Codicum opus egregium, Petrus Schoiffer de Gernsheim, glorioso fauente deo suis consignando scutis, feliciter finiuit. [Printer's Device in red.]
Folio. 1. Novellae: quires [110, 28, 3-610, 7-86, 910, 108, 11-1210, 138, 1410, 158, 166, 17-1810, 1910-1 (the blank second leaf cut away)], 169 leaves. 2. Consuetudines feudorum: quires [1-310, 46], 36 leaves. 3. Codicis libri X-XII: quires [18, 210, 3-58, 610, 78, 84, 9-1010, 1110+1 (the additional leaf prefixed)], 95 leaves. In all 300 leaves, two columns of text and two of commentary, 51 lines of text and 66 of commentary to the column, gothic letter, without printed signatures, catchwords or pagination. Two- to six-line spaces, some with guide-letters, left for capitals. Two pinholes, the use of which Schoeffer was thought to have abandoned a little earlier than the date of this volume. Titles and colophon printed in red. The text type is that of the Bible of 1462. Hain *9623. Brit. Mus. 15th cent., I, p. 33 (IC. 217).