<a href="http://jeanatacc.com/2011/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/guten.png"><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3753" alt="guten" src="http://jeanatacc.com/2011/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/guten.png" width="277" height="182" /></a>

<a href="http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/permanent/gutenbergbible/">http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/permanent/gutenbergbible/</a>

“The Gutenberg Bible” Extra Credit

The Gutenberg bible printed by Johann Gutenberg ca. 1454-55 is the first complete book printed with a movable metal type. Prior to its printing in 1454 or 1455, books were either copied by hand or printed from engraved wooden blocks, processes that could take months or even years to complete. Gutenberg’s invention revolutionized the distribution of knowledge by making it possible to produce many copies of a work in short amount of time. Gutenberg’s shop produced between 150 and 180 copies of the book, most printed on paper and a few vellum (scraped calfskin).<!--more-->
The Ransom Centers Gutenberg Bible is one of the 48 complete copies in the world. Of these complete copies, five are located in the United States; the other four copies are at the library of Congress, Harvard University, Yale University, and the Morgan Library &amp; Museum. Very little evidence survives in the public record of Gutenberg or his invention. He was born in Mainz, Germany, where he lived most of his life. He and his business partner quarreled over money matters, presumably in regard to their investment in the development of printing and the production of the bible. Later in his life, Gutenberg was given a pension by the Archbishop of Mainz and lived comfortably until his death in 1468.

Gutenberg invinted a wooden printing press that was also modeled on the winepress used in Germany. He also devised a means of casting individual pieces of metal type, which were used to print the words on the page, although there is still considerable debate about the process that he used. The textura typeforms used by Gutenberg were modeled on letterforms used in the manuscripts of his day. In Gutenbergs time, the standard language of the bible in Western Europe was Latin, and the most common version was St. Jerome’s translation, known as the Vulgate. The binding of the calfskin over wooden boards is not original but can be dated to 1600. Because of the deterioration, the spine was replaced in the first part of the twentieth century.

Like most copies of the Gutenberg Bible, this one has been bound in two volumes. The first volume contains a series of elaborate and colorful illuminated initial letters at the beginning of each book of the Bible. The second volume, apparently decorated by a different artist, features red and blue rubricated initials. Inscriptions in the margins indicate that the Bible was read from on a daily basis in a Carthusian monastery. Other unique features include papermakers hair embedded in the page and the date 1589 scratched into the gold illumination at eh beginning of the book of Deuteronomy.

The Ransom Centers copy of the Bible was purchased from the Pforzheimer Foundation of New York in 1978 to honor Dr. Harry Hutt Ransom, the centers founder. Before that, it belonged to several distinguished book collectors. Little is known about the history prior to 1800, but it almost certainly belongs to Carthuaian and Jesuit monasteries in the southern part of Germany. The Bible is probably the most valuable single artifact belonging to the University of Texas System. The last complete copy was sold in 1978, about the same time the Ransom Center purchased its copy. The exhibit about the Gutenberg Bible was very interesting to learn about its background and origins.