36 Line Baby Gutenberg in English is On the Way

Reproduction Bibles is pleased to announce that our first to print publication in the que will be a 36 line baby Gutenberg in a hand held format. This edition will be approximately 7 1/2” wide x 11” tall. This is larger than your typical bible, which tends to measure in at a smaller size and with smaller text sizes as well.  Our edition will be 15” wide x 11” tall when opened.  This edition is similar to what is properly known as the Bamberg Bible.

The mathematics behind our design format seeks to be as close as possible to the golden ratio, or the 2:1 ratio, which is why a well designed book such as the Gutenberg Bible is pleasant to look at when opened. Simply put, the width of a page is two-thirds its height. The same formula applies to the text block. That is the secret embedded in the medieval manuscript bibles as well as the Gutenberg, which sought to come as close as possible in order replicate the look and feel of a manuscript bible.

Since the established purpose of Reproduction Bibles is to reproduce medieval bibles, as they appeared, but in the English language, our edition will be true to period. There will be no doctrinal or denominationally oriented foot notes. There will be no cross references. And, there will be no verse numbers.  Instead, the authentic gothic textura text font, designed in Germany based on the actual Gutenberg Bible, will be punctuated by period Roman numeral chapter breaks, book opening letters, and chapter opening display letters, which were hand painted and then digitized for placement. (See photo below). We used the Gutenberg held by the Library of Congress as our model for developing our hand painted letters. There will not be any gold leaf illumination in this edition.

Every single epistle, prologue, preface, and argument that appeared in the Gutenberg in the Latin has been translated into English* and are part of our edition. *We are still working on translating about 200 words of Latin into English in one of the two prologues of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans. One of the delightful finds in our research is that not all of the prologues from the Latin Vulgate, the text of the medieval bible, were written by Jerome. Scholars believe that several were written by some, who fell out of favor with the church due to non orthodox views. These other writers are believed to have been Pelagius and Marcion.

Our edition features sixteen page gatherings that will be smyth sewn - the proper way to produce a book so that it lasts and so that the book lays flat when opened. Our paper, not shown here, will be a high quality, acid free archival paper designed for high end digital printers that has some grit to the texture as well as subtle patterns similar to what is seen in the paper used by Gutenberg. Yes, the cost of the paper is higher than your typical book. But, this is not your typical book or your typical bible, which is cluttered with far too much text on a single page.

Our color matching has been done, and we will be ready to go to print when completed since there remains the final stage of formatting, which is the placement of the headers, book opening letters, and display letters for chapters. When we zero in on the binding, we will issue another update.

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