"G" is for the German Bible before Luther

Leaf from the Koberger German Language Bible  ("click" photo for larger view).

     The Koberger Bible is the ninth of the eighteen editions of bibles printed in German baefore Luther (14 High-German and 4 Low-German), and is considered one of the most beautiful bibles ever printed.  The beautiful Bastarda typeface is reminiscent of manuscripts.  The hand-colored woodcuts of the Koberger Bible are impressive because of their rich colors and diverse shades.  It is assumed that many copies of the Bible were colored in Koberger's own workshop before they were sold, which was quite unusual at the time.  They exerted a decisive influence on later Bible illustrations, becoming the prototype for German bible illustrations in particular, fixing 109 as the standard number of woodcuts used.  Koberger left blank spaces for initials in the text, which were then painted with red and blue Lombard initials after the printing, probably also directly in Koberger's workshop.  The text is a translation of the Latin Vulgate taken from the fourth German b ible published by Zainer in Augsburg in 1475.  In addition to the Nuremberg Chronicle, the Koberger Bible is one of Koberger's most important prints.  It is estimated that the print run was between 1000 to 1500 copies, of which only about 150 extent copies still exist in public collections.  The printing office of Koberger was equipped with 25 manual presses, and employed about 100 assistants.  For its time, it was a large firm with international contacts and clients. 

Below, a page from the Zwingli Bible printed in Zurich by Christoph Froschauer ("click" for larger view)

     The Zurich Bible (also known as the Zwingli or Froschauer Bible) grew out of the "Prophezey", an exegetical worshop of Zurich clerics taking place every weekday working at a German redition of Bible texts.  The translation of Martin Luther was used as far as it was already completed.  Since the Prophets were still lacking in Luther's translation, the Zurich preachers issued this part of the Old Testament based on the translation of Ludwig Haetzer and Hans Denck, which had been published in Worms in 1527, and which the Zurich preachers considered a faithful translation from the Hebrew.  This helped Zwingli to complete the entire translation five years before Luther.  The first printing of the complete German Bible translated from other than Vulgate sources, was accomplished in 1531 at the printing shop of Christoph Froschauer, with an introduction by Zwingli and summaries of each chapter.  The Froschauer Bible was very popular at the time because of the clear type, pictorial decoration, and popular language.  Here displayed is a page, Genesis 2 and 3, from a printing c. 1560.  The woodcut is by Hans Springinklee, a German artist from Nuremberg and a pupil of Albrecht Durer.  Among the people, especially the Anabaptists, the first editions of the Froschauer Bibles and Testaments were greatly loved.  Thus the remarkable thing happened that in the course of the centuries those old editions were several times reprinted word for word.  All of these reprints were forbidden in Bernese territory as "Anabaptist Testaments", and wherever found they were confiscated.  In 1787 the Froschauer New Testament was reprinted at Ephrata, PA, by the Cloister Press, for the Pennsylvania Mennonites.

Below, photo of OCHF Library's copy of the Froschauer German Old Testament, published 1638 ("click" for larger image)

     The Wuerttembergische Landesbibliotheck Stuttgart has an extensive collection of Bibles and has issued a detailed bibliography of their collection.  Included in that bibliography is an illustrated Bible printed in Zurich in 1638.  They attribute the printing of the Bible to the Bodmer printing establishment that can be traced back through several other owners to what had been Froschauer's business.  Johann Jakob Bodmer bought it in 1626 but died several years later.  His widow and sons continued the business and it would have been his widow who was running the business in 1638 when our copy was printed.  Woodcuts are essentially the same as the first appearance of the woodcuts of Holbein's illustrations for the Bible 100 years earlier.  The image of God, however, has been removed from these woodcuts--as for example when Moses is depicted praying to God.  The 1638 edition incorporates various textual variants from 1531, 1548, 1597 and 1629, and the illustrations used also come from several different sources including some done after Holbein.  Although this edition is owned by a good number of Swiss libraries, and several other German, Dutch, and British collections, there is no other known copy in a library in North America other than this unique copy held by the OCHF Library.