[Bibles - Hot Press Bible]

The Holy Bible...Diligently Compared and Revised

      First Edition Hot Press Bible: The Holy Bible...Diligently Compared and Revised, Published by John Thompson and Abraham Small [from the Hot-Press of John Thompson] (Philadelphia), 1798. First edition, Large folio in 2 matching vols., 16 1/2 x 11 inches; Unpaginated: Vol. 1: [A]-7X (in 2s); Vol. 2: 7Y-10D (in 2s) + 10E (3s) + A-Ll (in 2s) (Apocrypha), [1] (NT title) + A-3T (in 2s) + [1] (Subscriber's list); Lacking frontispiece, pages well-struck, bright and clean with occasional light spotting, foxing and toning; Two matching volumes bound in contemporary full acid treated and polished calf, labels on spine with gilt lettering and decorative borders creating seven compartments, gilt dentelles, marbled end papers; extremities rubbed with small losses to edges and hinges, spine ends and labels chipped; Vol. 1 with sympathetic old rebacking. This copy contains subscribers' list, famous for including Thomas Jefferson, not found in all copies. An important example of early American printing, using a technique that seared the ink onto the page for a particularly clean printing. O'Callaghan p. 54: "This is the first hot-pressed edition of the Bible printed in America; it was issued originally in 40 numbers, commencing June, 1796, at half a dollar a number. Hence the division into volumes is altogether arbitrary. The text is from the Cambridge ed. published by John Baskerville, and is without notes of any kind..." Hills 62; Sabin 5182; Evans 30066, 31808, and 33408; Inventory #622 Please contact us at cmkester@nwark.com with any questions, or to request a print or electronic catalogue. We are professional antiquarian bookdealers with an extensive inventory of religious antiquarian volumes from 1500-1850, and are a member in good standing of the Arkansas Antiquarian Booksellers Association. St. Wulfstan’s Books.