"H" is for Hus

     The Czech literature of the Middle Ages is very rich in translations of Biblical books made from the Vulgate.  During the 14th Century all parts of the Bible seem to have been translated into the Bohemian language at different times and by different hands.  The oldest translations are those of the Psalter.  The New Testament must also have existed in the Bohemian language at that time, for according to a statement of Wycliffe, Anne, daughter of Charles IV, received in 1381 upon her marrying Richard II of England a Bohemian New Testament.
     It is certain that John Hus (1372-1415) had the Bible in Bohemian before him as a whole when he and his successors undertook a revision of the text according to the Vulgate.  The work of Hus on the Bible antedated 1412.  During the 15th Century the revision was continued.  The first complete printed Bible in the Bohemian language was published in Prague in 1488.  Other editions were issed at Kutna Hora, 1489, and Venice, 1506.
     Below are photos of OCHF Library's framed copy of a leaf from a hand-rubricated Bohemian Bible printed in Venice, Italy, by Peter Lichtenstein in 1506.  This Bible was prepared by John Hus and his followers, and edited by Jan Jindrissky of Zatec (Saaz) and Tomas Molek of Hradec Kralove.  The cost of printing this edition was financed entirely by three wealthy merchants of Prague for the use of the Ultraquist sect, then the strongest religious denomination among the Czechs.  This Bible is extensively rubricated with hand-painted initial letters and text emphases in red and blue inks.  Reference D&M 2180.

 

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