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[The Newe Testament of our Saviour Jesu Christe. Faythfully translated out of the Greke. With the notes and expositions of the darke places therein. … The pearle which Christ commaunded to be bought is here to be founde, not els to be sought.]
Summary
An attractive and profusely illustrated quarto Tyndale New Testament. This is the third edition of Jugge’s revision and the final Tyndale New Testament. A scarce book in a beautifully executed period-appropriate binding with nearly one hundred woodcuts.
Description
General title page in expert color facsimile. Calendar printed in red and black. Eighty-three woodcuts in ninety-four occurrences including a map of Palestine and a map of St. Paul’s journeys. Text in single column black letter type in paragraph format. This handsomely printed revision by Jugge is lavishly illustrated combining the woodblocks from the two previous editions with the blocks by Virgil Solis that were later used in the Bishops’ Bible. The large title-page portrait features young king Edward, who awarded Jugge a license to print the first edition. First chapter woodcut initials cover eleven lines of text. Divisional printed title to the Epistles of St. Paul and Revelation. Text presented with 38 lines to the full column. Jugge’s revision served as an effort to bring the English translation closer to the original Greek. The last of the over forty editions of Tyndale’s New Testament, with the headlines in Roman type.
Collation
[flueron]^8 (-[fleuron]1-3), [par]^10, A-Y^8 (-S1), Aa-Pp^8, Qq^4. 312 ff. Lacks 4 leaves altogether (title page, dedication, first leaf of calendar, John 21 – all provided in color facsimile).
Binding
Beautifully rebound in black calf. Covers with central gilt arabesque design featuring flowers and swirls, surrounded by small circles within a triple paneled border with corner fleurons. Spine with five raised bands and elaborate gilt tooling to compartments. Plain endpapers.
Condition
[par]4 lower marginal repair; E5 marginal repair; M8, N1 marginal loss with a few missing letters in facsimile; trimmed and cropped to fore-edge, reducing marginal notes and cross references; final leaf of Tables stained; infrequent light toning, occasional staining, but overall clean and crisp.
Provenance
[par]4 with “Edmund Barber” to top of page. The previous owner reports that the Bible fell out of a wall of a cottage during demolition in the 1960s, somewhere in West London.
Note
William Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament was the first to be printed in the English language. The father of the modern English language, and the father of the English Reformation, Tyndale was spurred on by the desire to “cause a boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scripture” than the clergy of the day. He would be killed for this cause in 1536. The translation was bitterly opposed by Bloody Mary and many copies of Tyndale’s Bibles were burned. Research has shown that at least eighty percent of the King James Version is Tyndale’s.
Scarcity
USTC records 21 copies in holding with most copies lacking the title page. RBH records only 1 copy at auction since 1936 with that copy lacking over 200 leaves.
References
Herbert 121; STC 2873; ESTC S122998; USTC 506525; Luborsky 2873; PMM 58 (1526 edition).