$106,000

One of the most prized bibliographical treasures in the world is a Gutenberg Bible. The first edition is four times as rare as a first folio of Shakespeare. Last week in Manhattan a perfect copy of this Bible was auctioned off for $106,000 to Dr. Abraham S. Wolf Rosenbach.*

The bidding was determined. Miss Belle da Costa Greene, librarian of the J. P. Morgan Library/- opened the contest with an offer of $50,000. Bids jumped at once by $5,000 each until William Evarts Benjamin, supposedly on behalf of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, called $85,000. Thereafter he had to compete only with Dr. Rosenbach. At $100,000 the sedate yet tense crowd cheered. Dr. Rosenbach offered $104,000. Mr. Benjamin covered him with $105,000. Then came "$106,000" from the Doctor. Mr. Benjamin kept silent.

This particular copy is called the Melk after its former owner, the Austrian Benedictine monastery in Melk. Its great value comes from its being one of the 45 known remaining copies of the first complete book to be printed from movable type. In 1455, 300 sheets were run off and bound. The text runs in two columns, 42 lines to the page, except for the first nine pages, which in the first edition have only 40 lines of text. Initials and decorations appear in colored inks. The 1282 pages, in two volumes bound in brown calf, each measure 10 3/8 by 15 in.

Johann Gensfleisch, called Gutenberg from the birthplace of his mother, Elsgen Wyrich, is thought to have printed this Bible. But Peter Schoffer and Johann Fust were also commercializing this newly devised method at that time (the middle of the 15th Century), and may possibly have done the work. Gutenberg never put his imprint on anything. But certainly in 1454 he printed and dated Pope Nicholas V's letter of indulgence on behalf of the King of Cyprus, the first dated piece of separate-type printing and the forerunner of this Bible.

*Writer, bibliographer, collector. He trips between his Philadelphia and Manhattan homes on the clew of precious printed matter or autographs. In 1923 the Rosenbach Co., of which he is secretary, paid approximately $43,350 for another copy.

/-This collection already owns three copies. Other U. S. owners are the N. Y. Public Library, the General Theological Seminary, Henry Edwards Huntington (railroader and book-collector), and Joseph E. Widener of Philadelphia.