1540 The Great Byble
The First Authorized Edition
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Pictured above is a successful test printing and binding of the first five books of the Great Byble of 1540. This is a large format 11" x 17" edition, just a test, and an exciting one. We hope to begin production of a large 8 1/2" x 11" sized format edition of the Great Byble in 2021. The production issue that will become for sale will feature the same, or similar, period woodcuts used in the edition partially produced in Paris in 1539 and then finished in London that year. We will be using a heavier typeface, and will print on laid cotton and bind the book in a real leather period binding.
The story of this Bible is remarkable. It is the grandfather of the King James Version of 1611. And, it is pre Elizabethan in language. It is largely a Textus Receptus Bible, the translation work from William Tyndale and Myles Coverdale, and came into being prior to the Puritans, who fled England when Henry VIII's daughter Mary took the throne. Under Mary, this Bible authorized for use in the Church of England, in every parish, was ordered to be confiscated and destroyed.
As of January 2020, we have progressed in our research of the Great Byble to the extent that we are now confident that we can produce a Critical Edition, or perhaps better said, a Collated Edition, of this monumental achievement from the early English Reformation. This Critical Edition of the Great Byble, when completed, will contain the text from the 1540 edition as well as front matter and prologues from later editions. This edition, moreover, will be finished with true to period ornate letters and illustrations in order to demonstrate the full publishing potential of the times that was violently cut short by the Inquisition directed against the Reformation and English language translations of the Bible. Our end goal is to produce a large format 11" x 16 1/2" edition as well as an 8 1/2 " x11" letter sized edition - in short a Mid-Sixteenth Century English Reformation Byble.
To hear a presentation on Henry VIII's Great Byble, listen to the British Library.
The story of this Bible is remarkable. It is the grandfather of the King James Version of 1611. And, it is pre Elizabethan in language. It is largely a Textus Receptus Bible, the translation work from William Tyndale and Myles Coverdale, and came into being prior to the Puritans, who fled England when Henry VIII's daughter Mary took the throne. Under Mary, this Bible authorized for use in the Church of England, in every parish, was ordered to be confiscated and destroyed.
As of January 2020, we have progressed in our research of the Great Byble to the extent that we are now confident that we can produce a Critical Edition, or perhaps better said, a Collated Edition, of this monumental achievement from the early English Reformation. This Critical Edition of the Great Byble, when completed, will contain the text from the 1540 edition as well as front matter and prologues from later editions. This edition, moreover, will be finished with true to period ornate letters and illustrations in order to demonstrate the full publishing potential of the times that was violently cut short by the Inquisition directed against the Reformation and English language translations of the Bible. Our end goal is to produce a large format 11" x 16 1/2" edition as well as an 8 1/2 " x11" letter sized edition - in short a Mid-Sixteenth Century English Reformation Byble.
To hear a presentation on Henry VIII's Great Byble, listen to the British Library.
Test print of the 8 1/2 " x11" letter sized edition from October 2020.
