bavarikon4UDescription
The first exemplar of the 36-line Bible was discovered back in 1760. At first, it was considered the oldest kind of printed Bible ever, since this copy had been printed with the Donate Calendar type of Johannes Gutenberg (d. 1468), which he had used for the first time between 1445 and 1454. This type is even older than that of the 42-line Bible, which is dated to 1452-1454. Only in 1889, it could be established that the B 36 is a reprint - even though beset with some mistakes - of Gutenberg's 42-line Bible. It was not printed in Mainz, as had long been assumed, but in Bamberg, presumably during the period between 1459 and 1461. The printer is unknown. Albrecht Pfister (d. in ca. 1466), who had long been considered the printer of the B 36, according to recent research is no longer held as a possibility. Whether Gutenberg himself took part in the printing of the B 36, is under debate in book history. It is more likely that the B 36 was printed by one or several of his journeymen, possibly by Heinrich Keffer, who had settled in Bamberg from 1458/59. The B 36 is much rarer than Gutenberg's B 42; with 884 sheets, it is also considerably more comprehensive. It was usually bound into two or three volumes. So far, 13 exemplars are known, among which are four complete copies and several fragments. The University Library Erlangen- Nuremberg only owns the first volume. // Datum: 2017