The text here is taken from the Wycliffe version of the New Testament and is printed in English black-letter, contained within handsome 16th century–style woodcut borders, with the plates placed appropriately next to the relevant text. The work first appeared in England in 1877 as A New Biblia Pauperum in folio format and then was reissued in 1884 in this small format as A Smaller Biblia Pauperum; the final name change occurred with this American edition.

A suitable candidate for collections of Bibles, Victoriana, illustrated books, OR biblio-blunders!

•  Herbert 2008 (note).   Publisher's gold-stamped vellum with brass clasps, one missing the hasp; vellum dust-soiled and darkened, spine torn and repaired. All edges uncut. Ex-library with markings on endpapers only; a lesser but still a good, enjoyable copy.  (23639)

•  Publisher's cream paper–covered sides, spine with title stamped in black; ex-library with covers stained and front one bearing an inked numeral (though all strong). Front pastedown with institutional bookplate; title-page pressure-stamped; first text page with rubber-stamped numeral in lower margin; back pastedown with pocket; upper edges rubber-stamped, front fly-leaf with paper adhesion. Yet, all that said, pages clean and the project a loving one.  (23609)

As Darlow and Moule comment, “by printing the Rheims Testament in full, side by side with the Bishops' version, [Fulke] secured for the former a publicity which it would not otherwise have obtained, and was indirectly responsible for the marked influence which Rheims exerted on the Bible of 1611.” Alan Thomas elaborates by observing that “many a dignified or felicitous phrase was silently lifted by the editors of King James's Version, and thus passed into the language” (Great Books and Book Collectors, p. 108).

Provenance:  Signature of a contemporary owner “A. Thorpe, York,” undated, on A2.

•  STC 2900; Darlow & Moule 265; Herbert 265; ESTC S115769.   Modern black calf, covers framed with single gilt rule and paneled in gilt rolls with corner fleurons. Title-page mounted, with outer edge and small hole in lower margin reinforced; dust-soiled. A2 with early inked ownership signature (see above) and notation; reinforced at hinge (inside). Other markings: two pages with marginal notations and four pages with corrections, both inked by an early hand. Bug-spotting on several preliminary leaves. Light waterstaining on some early and later leaves, with occasional odd stains and spots elsewhere, not impairing sense of text. Dust-soiling on index pages. Two preliminary leaves missing small pieces of paper in blank margins; small hole at top outer corner of Kkkk4; and small chip at top edge of Hhhh2. Fold-mark at top outer corner of Vvv2. In fact, a very nice copy of an important book.  (24477)

The engraved title-page is very fine, with Moses and Aaron flanking the title, the British royal arms above, and a scene of London below. The rest of the plates are all maps, as would not be the case in an Anglican Bible: These are all double-page, full of detail, and very attractive. The first, a map of the world, is labelled in Latin and Italian, and the rest in Dutch.

•  Herbert 743; Wing (rev.) 2310. Contemporary diced calf, rebacked; one joint again open and the other open, but cords holding. Covers ruled with single gilt fillets, edges with single gilt rolls. Spine compartments ornately gilt. Covers stained and with abrasions and some loss of leather, especially over corners; spine dry and rubbed, with loss of leather and gilt. All edges speckled red. Scattered spots of light soiling and staining, especially in the margins. Entirely untattered.

This edition is printed in two unruled columns with shouldernotes, sidenotes (including dates), and italic headers. Acts 6:3 wrongly reads “ye may” for “we may.” Tables of kindred and affinity, weights and measures, money, and time are found on the last two pages. The New Testament sectional title has a woodcut vignette showing the arms of the University.

Binding: 19th-century black calf, elaborately tooled in blind in imaginative evocation of an “over the top” 17th-century binding, being horizontally, vertically, and diagonally ruled, foliate and floral devices within. Spine compartments tooled within, with gilt title in second one and gilt “Barker 1637” gilt at base. Red marbled endpapers. All edges gilt.

Provenance: 20th-century bookplate of C. ( or J.?) F. Weidmann, D.D. on front pastedown.

•  Herbert 757; Darlow & Moule 595; Wing (rev.) 2315; Loftie, A Century of Bibles, 354; ESTC R213033. (The title-page is from ESTC S90540 or S90541.) Binding as above, a little rubbed, and refurbished. Occasional light browning, soiling, and shallow bumping or chipping (not touching text). Lacking engraved title (replaced with title and preliminary leaf from another edition). A bibliophile’s delight, and warning.

Provenance: Front pastedown with red leather bookplate gilt-stamped “Sarah Jeaffreson.” Also with tipped-in bookplate of the Zion Research Library’s A. Marguerite Smith Collection and with laid-in bookplate of the Endowment for Biblical Research, Boston.

Binding: Red goat, covers framed in floral gilt rolls and spine compartments with gilt-stamped geometric and floral decorations; very delicate and pretty. Board edges gilt, gilt inner dentelles, all edges gilt.

•  ESTC T91635; Darlow & Moule 1238. Binding moderately rubbed and abraded with spine slightly darkened; corners bumped and lower one of front cover discolored at leather-edge; gilt on edges faded almost away. Inside some age-toning, with a handful of small, light spots; one leaf torn along inner margin. Back fly-leaf with pencilled notation; scattered stray pencil marks to other leaves. A pleasing little Oxford Bible.

•  Prayer Book, Psalter: not in ESTC. Bible: not in Darlow & Moule or ESTC; Herbert 1286. Contemporary calf, covers panelled in blind with remnants of clasps. Front joint open with cords strongly holding; covers abraded with incisions and leather loss to edges; spine leather dry and cracking; front fly-leaf detached. Lacking title-page and two preliminary leaves of Prayer Book; another early leaf detached with a closed tear across, no loss of text. Bible: scattered foxing and brown spotting, with a few closed tears and occasional chipping in the margins, resulting in loss of words from a few shouldernotes. The copy described by Herbert had engravings and maps not present here; this copy is complete textually.

Provenance: The front fly-leaf bears an inked inscription reading “From this Book our 4 Dear Children were Babtized [sic] by the Rev. S. Good, Rector of St. Anns Blk. Friars, And afterwards Christened by their Dear Uncle the Rev. Charles Brown, Rector of Whitestone, near Exeter, Devon.” The children's baptismal dates range from 1806 through 1814.

•  ESTC T93069; Griffiths, Bibliography of the Book of Common Prayer, 1791/7. Binding as above, leather slightly worn over joints and extremities. Front fly-leaf with collector's small bookplate, reverse with inscription as above, title-page with owner's name and date (1806) inked in upper margin. Pages clean.

George Campbell (1719–96) was a minister of the Church of Scotland, theologian, and principal of Marischal College. He wrote a number of theological works, including a defense of miracles in response to David Hume, and was noted for originality of argument as well as charity towards his opponents. This translation of the Gospels was first published in England in 1789; the work consists of a preface and preliminary dissertations, the actual translation, and the notes, with the whole being very scholarly, resorting frequently to the Greek in the dissertations and notes.

Provenance: Title-page and contents leaf with early inked inscriptions reading “Jas. Booth.”

•  ESTC W4383; Evans 30086; Hills, English Bible in America, 56. On Campbell, see: The Dictionary of National Biography. Contemporary treed sheep, rubbed and abraded with leather lost at corners/spine and cracking over joints and spine. Title-page and contents inscribed as described above; endpapers waterstained, and pages with light spots of foxing. Paper in many sections faintly blue.

Provenance: Front free endpaperswith inscription reading “Mary Miller — Greenwich No. 2 10mo [?] 1st 1837.”

•  Hills 114; Shaw & Shoemaker 5850. Contemporary sheep, abraded, with leather cracking over spines and joints cracked or cracking; spines with gilt-stamped leather title labels. Vol. III lacking first contents leaf; vol. IV lacking front free endpaper and preliminary blank. Occasional spots of foxing and varying degrees of age-toning; some leaves with edge chips.

Binding: Contemporary red straight-grain morocco, covers framed in gilt single fillet, spine with gilt-stamped title. All edges gilt.

•  NSTC B2162; Lowndes, Bibliographer’s Manual, 2002 (for 1798 Tattersall ed.); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature, 1269 (likewise). Binding as above, spine and outer edge of front cover darkened, joints and edges with moderate shelf wear. Front pastedown with institutional bookplate and donor bookplate; front free endpaper reverse with inked ownership inscription and pencilled inscription dated 1814; title-page with small inked initials in upper outer corner. Light foxing. In fact quite nice.

The text generally follows the Challoner–Rheims revision, although the notes are collected from various sources. The volume is illustrated with two frontispieces and17 plates engraved by J. Bottomley, Symns and Mitchell, and others after paintings by Westall, Raphael, Reynolds, et al. Issued in parts in a small print run, this Bible is now uncommon.

•  Darlow & Moule 1034. Contemporary treed calf, rebacked some time ago in plain calf with gilt-ruled bands and gilt-stamped title-label; sides rubbed and scraped, with spine scuffed, leather worn over extremities, front joint cracked from weight of oversized volume. Hinges (inside) reinforced with cloth tape. Lacking title-page. Plate from Genesis I:4 removed, and laid back in with margins cut away. First few leaves with edges ragged. Pages with offsetting around plates; occasional light spots of staining, mostly confined to outer margins.

erotic text

Copies with all seven plates and the map are not as common as they once were.

•  Hills 209; O’Callaghan p. 108; Shaw & Shoemaker 24829; Wright, Early American Bibles, 352–53; Rumball-Petre, Rare Bibles, 188. Contemporary sheep, spine with raised bands and gilt-stamped leather title-label; binding and spine label rubbed, with a few pinpoint holes of insect damage to spine. Small ticket of a private collector on front pastedown; one plate with inked ownership inscription dated 1824 on the reverse. Folding map torn along inner edge, tear repaired some time ago; map foxed, with small edge chips. Pages age-toned, with some spotting; edges tattered, occasionally with loss of a few letters in shouldernotes. Two signatures (one in index) separated, one with outer edges chewed, affecting a number of words; one leaf torn across; one plate with short tear to outer margin not touching image; one leaf with portion of first few lines torn away and now laid in. Botanical matter laid in, as well as that other thing.

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 27881.   Publisher's sheep, red leather gilt-stamped title label and gilt rules on spine; rubbed and corners bumped with leather cracked over joints. Offsetting from turn-ins to endpapers and first/last leaves, with some pencil marks to front pastedown; notable age-toning and foxing throughout except to pp. 379–402, which makes this an interesting volume for book-studies teaching purposes. One page with impression faint at beginning of most lines; otherwise, a clean and complete text.  (21738)

•  Hills 259; Shaw & Shoemaker 30867. Contemporary treed sheep, spine with gilt-ruled raised bands and gilt-stamped leather title-label; binding rubbed, front joint cracked, back joint starting from top, spine extremities chipped. Front pastedown with private collector’s small bookplate, title-page with early inked ownership inscription in upper margin. Pages age-toned.

Provenance

•  Shaw & Shoemaker 47213; Hills 375. Contemporary sheep double-panelled in blind, spine with gilt-ruled raised bands and gilt-stamped leather title label; binding rubbed and unevenly faded, leather cracking over spine. Foxing ranging from mild to severe; last few leaves waterstained; some dog-earing. One worm track to upper outer margin of a few leaves. New Testament lacking title. Well used but not abused; an evocative copy.

Provenance: Inscription reading, “William Merritt's Book, Bedford(?), 1830.

•  Adomeit, Three Centuries of Thumb Bibles, A51; Shoemaker 12834; Rosenbach, Children, 626; not in Welch.   Contemporary black calf. TItle-leaf and following three closely trimmed into print with loss of letters but not sense; a good example of this Troy-printed little Bible.  (23015)

The family record leaves here were partially filled in with occasions in the lives of James M. Welling (b. 1807, d. 1882), his wife Susan Vail Welling (b. 1805, d. 1886), and their children; the final entry notes the death of Mark Hermon [sic] Wheeler in 1908.

Provenance: Front pastedown with small bookplate of prominent collector Michael Zinman.

•  Hills 465 (describing 684 pp. andonly three plates); Shoemaker 11809 (for an edition of this year, but with only 684 pp.); O’Callaghan gives 1818 Holbrook stereotype edition only. Contemporary mottled sheep, spine with gilt-stamped title-label; binding rubbed and abraded, with leather cracking over spine and cracked over joints. Pages browned, with waterstaining to inner margins. One plate with hole to corner of image; oversized, folding map with small hole near edge.

Single-click the binding image for a detail.

Binding: Publisher’s dark olive green morocco, covers with gilt-stamped altar vignette, spine with gilt-stamped title and blind-stamped compartment frames; corners, spine extremities, and gilt rubbed. All edges gilt. 

Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplate of Lady Seymour; front fly-leaf with inked inscription reading “Miss Aakes. March 11 1829.”

•  This ed. not in Herbert. Front pastedown and fly-leaf with bookplate and inscription as above; front free endpaper with obscure inked monogram; back pastedown with four lines of numerical notations. Pages clean save for one lightly foxed signature in the N.T.

Binding: Contemporary red straight-grain morocco, covers framed in gilt rolls, spine gilt extra, front cover gilt-stamped “John Bradley.” All edges marbled.

•  Shoemaker 31685. Binding as above, sides darkened, corners and spine rubbed, joints cracked with sewing holding but quite fragile. Fly-leaves with early pencilled ownership inscriptions and annotations. Light to moderate foxing. Separate title-page for second section (only) lacking.