“TO VISUALIZE THE EVENTS OF THE BIBLE IN A GRAND STYLE”: LARGE FOLIO ILLUSTRATED KING JAMES BIBLE, CAMBRIDGE 1660, WITH WONDERFUL 17TH-CENTURY PRESENTATION INSCRIPTION AND FINE LARGE JERUSALEM MAP

BIBLE. The Holy Bible Containing the Bookes of the Old and New Testament. Cambridge: John Field, 1660, 1659. Folio (12 by 17 inches), period-style full calf, elaborately gilt-decorated spines and boards, red morocco spine label, raised bands, marbled endpapers.

Monumental 1660 Cambridge edition of the King James Bible, illustrated with ten double-page engravings and a large map of Jerusalem. “It presented the standard text of the Authorized Version in perhaps the most impressive form available in the mid-17th century.” Beautifully bound.

The King James Version of the Bible (first published 1611) has exercised an incalculable impact on piety, language and literature throughout the English-speaking world. Macaulay praised it as “a book, which if everything else in our language should perish, would alone suffice to show the whole extent of its beauty and power” (PMM 114). “In 1660, John Ogilby reissued the large folio Bible of 1659, published by John Field, the printer to the University of Cambridge, with a number of additional engraved plates… For this issue, Ogilby supplied eight whole sheet engravings, seven of which were by [Wenceslaus] Hollar… Nicolaes Visscher supplied Ogilby with sets of engravings from his own stock, most of which were the work of Cornelis Visscher, after Rubens, de Vos, de Bruyn, Tintoretto and others… Ogilby’s Bible was a very expensive book… It presented the standard text of the Authorized Version in perhaps the most impressive form available in the mid-17th century. Its illustrations were works of the best artists, and allowed those who could afford the book to visualize the events of the Bible in a grand style” (Museum of the History of Science, Oxford). “The finest edition of the Holy Bible then extant” (Lowndes, 1367). Published in two volumes (dividing the contents at the end of Job); this copy without the Volume II title page. With ten double-plate engravings: the Temple furnishings; maps of the Holy Land; three of Solomon’s Temple; Adam and Eve in Paradise; a group portrait of the Evangelists; and a large folding map (approximately 17 by 43 inches) of Jerusalem. All Old Testament plates are engraved by Hollar, save for the plate of Eden, by Lombart. Also with engraved frontispiece bearing the arms of King Charles II, engraved general title page depicting Solomon enthroned and floriated woodcut initials. With separate New Testament title page dated 1659. Text ruled in red throughout. Includes Apocrypha. Bound with Ogilby’s 1660 edition of the Book of Common Prayer. Darlow & Moule 525. Herbert 668. Wing B2258. Griffiths 1660:8 (prayer book). Armorial bookplate. Old effaced inscription and shelf number. Elaborate calligraphic gift inscription on recto of prayer book frontispiece, reading: “July the 26th 1683. This booke is presented to the truly honoured, pious and vertuous Lady, the Lady Esther Skrymshere, as the gift of her kinsman and faithful servant John Bulton. Hee desires her acceptance hereof and that it may continue at Norbury Mahnour for the heires Males of Sir Charles Skrymshers family, desiring that family may long continue in prosperity there. Esther Skrymsher[’s] booke. The Property of Mrs. Noel, Daughter, of Hon. Boothby Skrymsher.” The Skrymsheres were a prominent Leicestershire family; Dr. Samuel Johnson claimed that Sir Charles was “very nearly related” to him.

A beautiful volume.