Pocket Bible

F-m5vq

Middletown, CT, Wesleyan University Library, BS399.L3 E33

General Information

Title Miniature Manuscript Bible
Material vellum
Place of Origin Paris, France
Date of Origin ca. 1240 A.D.
General Remarks

The Latin Vulgate version, usually attributed to St. Jerome, is here executed in angular Gothic script, eleven lines to the inch, on finest vellum. These small portable Bibles were produced in great numbers by the Dominicans (1250-1275) in the early days of the Sorbonne. It has been calculated that in the year 1250, it would have taken the earnings of a day laborer for fifteen years to purchase a manuscript Bible of this type. A leaf book containing a title leaf and 38 individually matted original leaves excerpted from Bibles, with a printed explanatory caption on each.