BIBLE IN ENGLISH (COVERDALE’S VERSION) | The whole Byble. that is the holy scripture of the Olde and Newe testament faythfully translated into Englyshe by Myles Couerdale, and newly ouersene and correcte. (Zurich:) Printed (by Christoph Froschauer, and S. Mierdman?) for Andrewe Hester, 1550

BIBLE IN ENGLISH (COVERDALE’S VERSION)

The whole Byble. that is the holy scripture of the Olde and Newe testament faythfully translated into Englyshe by Myles Couerdale, and newly ouersene and correcte. (Zurich:) Printed (by Christoph Froschauer, and S. Mierdman?) for Andrewe Hester, 1550

4to (8 7/8 x 7 1/4 in.; 228 x 185 mm). Black letter, text in two columns, woodcut initials, many illustrating the Dance of Death; lacking 8 of 624 leaves: lacks in OT title with woodcut border and table ([Maltese cross] 1, 7–8), A1.8 (the first the beginning of Genesis with woodcut of the creation of Eve); lacks in NT qq2–4; dampstaining at lower fore-edge corner with some loss, occasionally affecting text, especially at end, first 20 leaves with significant marginal fraying, tears, and repair (but little loss of text), other scattered staining, tears, and repair. Nineteenth-century calf, marbled endpapers, earlier red edges; worn, rebacked preserving original spine, front cover detached. Sold with all faults, not subject to return.

The last edition of Coverdale's version printed during his lifetime. As the catalogue of the 2004 Princeton exhibition of Bibles commented, "It is a noteworthy sign of the flux of Bible culture in the reign of Edward VI that Coverdale's version still found a market, long after Coverdale himself had assembled, in the Great Bible, a more authoritative text."

REFERENCES

STC 2080; ESTC S122319; Herbert 84

PROVENANCE

Numerous early signatures and annotations, many from seventeenth-century members of the Peachey family of Soham, Cambridgeshire — Rev. Thomas Zouch (1737–1815) of Wycliffe, Yorkshire (gift inscription on early preserved flyleaf) — Eighteenth-century bookplate with JB and Durham — Early nineteenth-century bookplate with JL and bridled horse head crest