Biblia, Piibli, Paipera

[Single leaf from a Bible in French]. Le premier volume de la Bible en Francois. Paris: Nicolas Couteau, 1541.

The single leaf on display is from a 1541 French language Bible issued by the Parisian bookseller and printer Nicolas Couteau. The text is from the Second Book of Esdras (Apocrypha).

The earliest complete version of the Bible in French was written in the thirteenth century. Bibles in French were first printed from the 1470s but most were based not on the Vulgate or any other Bible, but on Guyart de Moulins’ thirteenth century summary of the Scriptures known as the Bible historiee.

The first complete French Bible of the Reformation era was translated by the Paris-based scholar and theologian Jacques Lefevre d’Etaples (ca. 1455-1536) and printed at Antwerp in 1530.

[Single leaf from a Bible in French]. Le premier volume de la Bible en Francois. Paris: Nicolas Couteau, 1541.
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[Bible Selections in Italian]. Gabriele Simeoni. Figure del Vecchio Testamento: illustrate di bellissime stanze volgari da Gabriel Simeoni. Vinegia [Venice]: Nicolo Beuilaqua & Compagni, 1574.

The earliest book in the Reed Collections containing biblical texts in Italian is an illustrated verse adaptation of the Old and New Testaments, with woodcuts printed on each page with text below. The work of the Florentine humanist and translator Gabriele Simeoni (1509-1575), it was first printed in 1570.

The editio princeps of the Bible in Italian was translated from the Vulgate by Niccolo Malermi (ca. 1422-1481) and printed in Venice in 1471. Malermi’s Bible attained considerable popularity and underwent numerous reprints until 1567.

[Bible Selections in Italian]. Gabriele Simeoni. Figure del Vecchio Testamento: illustrate di bellissime stanze volgari da Gabriel Simeoni. Vinegia [Venice]: Nicolo Beuilaqua & Compagni, 1574.
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