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MINIATURE BIBLE, in English – HARRIS, Benjamin (d. c.1716).
[The Holy Bible… done into Verse for the Benefit of weak Memories]. London: Benjamin Harris Senior, 1698.
Very rare children’s miniature Bible in verse, preserved in the original stamped binding. Its author and publisher, Benjamin Harris, conducted his business in London from 1668 to 1686 before moving to Boston, Massachusetts in 1686 and finally returning to London in 1695, where he remained until his death around 1716. Harris ‘was a virulent puritan whose anti-Catholicism is pungently expressed in his Protestant Tutor of 1679 and who was closely involved with the production of America’s most famous early children’s book, The New England Primer’ (Alderson and de Marez Oyens, p.21).
Although ESTC records no copies of the text published before 1715, we are able to trace four other copies of what appears to be the earliest extant edition: 2 copies of a different 1698 issue held at the University of California and the Morgan Library (lacking 5 and 14 leaves respectively); a copy in a later binding and lacking the final two leaves which sold at Forum Auctions on 28 January 2021 (lot 58, £12,000); and an apparently identical copy, preserved in the same original stamped binding, which was offered at Sotheby’s in May 1983. The Native American scene on the cover of the copy at the Morgan Library indicates that it may have belonged to an issue reserved by the publisher for the American market. Cf. Alderson and de Marez Oyens, Be Merry and Wise, 32; Charles L. Nichols, ‘The Holy Bible in Verse’, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 36 (April 1926); Wilbur Macey Stone, ‘The Holy Bible in Verse, 1698’, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 44 (April 1934).
32mo (74 x 54mm). Collation: A-D8 (lacking the apparent letterpress title A1; retaining the blank D8); additional title on A2r within woodcut border, further woodcuts to A3r and C4r, The New Testament with separate letterpress title at C3r, publisher’s advertisement leaf D7 (some minor dog-earing to corners, a few edges slightly nicked). Original panel-stamped sheep over thin boards, front cover depicting two figures, possibly Adam and Eve, the lower cover with a vase of flowers bearing the initials ‘W H’ (light wear, small loss of leather at head of spine). Provenance: A. K. (initials inside front cover dated 1699) – Ann Dadson (inscription and pen trials to blank D8 dated 9 May, 1750) – unidentified armorial bookplate on rear pastedown.
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