First English Bible from 1536 set to fetch £10,000
AN EXTREMELY rare copy of the first Bible to be printed in English has emerged for sale for £10,000.
The text was translated directly from the Hebrew and Greek by Protestant reformist William Tyndale in 1536.
Tyndale, who printed just 3,000 copies of the New Testament, was condemned as a heretic by the Catholic Church’s Cardinal Wolsey.
As a result, first editions of the Tyndale Bible were hunted down and destroyed, so survivors are exceptionally scarce. This is only the fourth copy to appear on the market since the 1970s.
Tyndale himself paid the ultimate price – he was executed and burnt at the stake, crying out as he died: “Lord! Open the King of England’s eyes!”
His plea was heard and two years later in 1538 Henry VIII authorised an English translation known as the Great Bible, which included much of Tyndale’s translation. The King James Version we know today was published in 1611 and re-edited in 1769.
Titled The Newe Testament Yet Once Agayne Corrected By Willyam Tyndale, the leather-bound volume was discovered in a pile of books from a now-defunct library.
The 228-page Bible with woodcut illustrations has 48 pages missing.
It is expected to fetch £8,000-£10,000 in the sale at Chiswick Auctions, west London, on November 28. Clive Moss, head of printed books and manuscripts, said: “The Tyndale Bible was the first printed edition of the Bible in English, full-stop. Most of the early copies are in bad condition.
“Although thousands of them were smuggled into England, they were vigorously hunted and destroyed by ecclesiastical authorities, making this exceptionally rare.
“It was among other antiquarian books and it was very easy to dismiss when I came across it as it was missing its title page.”