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  1. Home
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  3. A Textual History of the King James Bible
  • This book is no longer available to purchase from Cambridge Core
  • Cited by 16
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press
Online publication date:
September 2009
Print publication year:
2005
Online ISBN:
9780511488115
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511488115
Subjects:
Literature, Biblical Studies - New Testament, English Literature 1830-1900, Religion
Information

Book description

David Norton re-edited the King James Bible for Cambridge, and this 2005 book arose from his intensive work on that project. Here he shows how the text of the most important Bible in the English language was made, and how, for better and for worse, it changed in the hands of printers and editors until, in 1769, it became the text we know today. Using evidence as diverse as the manuscript work of the original translators, and the results of extensive computer collation of electronically held texts, Norton has produced a scholarly edition of the King James Bible for the new century that will restore the authority of the 1611 translation. This book describes this fascinating background, explains Norton's editorial principles and provides substantial lists and tables of variant readings. It will be indispensable to scholars of the English Bible, literature, and publishing history.

Reviews

‘His scholarship cannot be bettered … In the face of centuries of highly coloured myths, his dogged and committed analytic detail is greatly to be welcomed.‘

David Daniell - University College London

‘… meticulously researched and clearly written … This is a tremendous achievement and a valuable addition to biblical literature.‘

Source: Contemporary Reviews

‘In recounting the history of the textual transmission of the English Bible, Dr Norton has produced an impressive piece of work. Not only does he provide a mass of information on a much fuller scale than has ever been attempted before, but he presents it with admirable clarity, using such manuscript evidence as is available, and full lists and tables of variant readings as well as the resources of computer technology. In short, it is a milestone in its particular field, and other scholars and students will find it indispensable.‘

J. R. Porter Source: Church Times

‘… work of awe-inspiring diligence. … one can have nothing but praise for a beautifully written and handsomely presented piece of work.‘

Source: Epworth Review

'His book will be the definitive work on the subject for a long time to come, and is unlikely to be superseded unless and until significant new evidence comes to light …'

Source: Churchman

'… detailed analysis … formidable attention … an essential reference.'

Source: Religious Studies Review

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Contents

Contents
References
Bibliography
Works Cited
Allen, Ward S. Translating for King James. Nashville, Tenn.: Vanderbilt University Press, 1969
Allen, Ward S. Translating the New Testament Epistles 1604–1611: A Manuscript from King James's Westminster Company. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International for Vanderbilt University Press, 1977
Allen, Ward S., and Edward C. Jacobs. The Coming of the King James Gospels: A Collation of the Translators' Work-in-Progress. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 1995
Arber, Edward. A Transcript of the Registers of the Company of Stationers of London; 1554–1640 A.D. 5 vols. London, 1875–94; reprinted, Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith, 1967
Babbage, Stuart Barton. Puritanism and Richard Bancroft. London: SPCK, 1962
Barlow, William. The Svmme and Svbstance of the Conference … at Hampton Court. Ianuary 14. 1603 (i.e. 1604). London, 1604. Facsimile, intro. William T. Costello and Charles Keenan. Gainesville: Scholars' Facsimiles and Reprints, 1965
Black, M. H. Cambridge University Press 1584–1984. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984
Carter, Harry. A History of Oxford University Press: Volume 1: To the Year 1780. Oxford: Clarendon, 1975
Cathcart, K. J., and R. P. Gordon, trans. and annot., The Targum of the Minor Prophets (The Aramaic Bible, vol. 14). Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1989
Curtis, Thomas. The Existing Monopoly, an Inadequate Protection, of the Authorised Version of Scripture. London, 1833
Daiches, David. The King James Version of the English Bible. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1941
Daniell, David. William Tyndale: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994
Dictionary of National Biography. Ed. Leslie Stephen and Sydney Lee. London: Smith, Elder, 1908–9
Fry, Francis. A Description of the Great Bible … also of Editions in Large Folio, of the Authorized Version … London, 1865
Fuller, Thomas. The History of the University of Cambridge. 1655; ed. Marmaduke Prickett and Thomas Wright, Cambridge, 1840
Goodspeed, Edgar J. Problems of New Testament Translation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1945
Greetham, D. C. Textual Scholarship: An Introduction. New York: Garland Publishing, 1994
Greg, W. W. A Companion to Arber. Oxford: Clarendon, 1967
Hallam, Henry. Introduction to the Literature of Europe in the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries. 4 vols. 1837–9; sixth edn, London, 1860
Herbert, A. S. Historical Catalogue of Printed Editions of the English Bible 1525–1961. London: The British and Foreign Bible Society; New York: The American Bible Society, 1968
Jacobs, Edward Craney. ‘King James's Translators: The Bishops' Bible New Testament Revised’. The Library, 6th series, 14: 2 (June, 1992). 100–26
Jacobs, Edward Craney. ‘Two Stages of Old Testament Translation for the King James Bible’. The Library, 6th series, 2: 1 (March, 1980). 16–39
Kilburne, William. Dangerous Errors in Several Late Printed Bibles. Finsbury, 1659 (1660)
Lowth, Robert, trans. George Gregory. Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews. 2 vols. London, 1787
McKitterick, David. A History of Cambridge University Press. 3 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992–
McMullin, B. J. ‘The 1629 Cambridge Bible’. Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 8: 4 (1984). 381–97
Mombert, J. I. The English Versions of the Bible. 2nd edn. London, 1890
Morgan, Paul. ‘A King's Printer at Work: Two Documents of Robert Barker’. The Bodleian Library Record, 13: 5 (October, 1990). 370–4
Nicolson, Adam. Power and Glory: Jacobean England and the Making of the King James Bible (American edition: God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible). London: HarperCollins, 2003
Norton, David. A History of the Bible as Literature. 2 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993
Nicolson, Adam. ‘John Bois's Notes on the Revision of the King James Bible New Testament: A New Manuscript’. The Library, 6th series, 18: 4 (December, 1996). 328–46
Norton, David. ‘Imagining Translation Committees at Work: The King James and the Revised Versions’. In The Bible as Book: the Reformation, ed. Orlaith O'Sullivan, pp. 157–68. London: The British Library; Newcastle, Del.: Oak Knoll Press, 2000
Parkes, M. B. Pause and Effect. Aldershot: Scolar, 1992
Paine, Gustavus S. The Men Behind the King James Version (originally The Learned Men, 1959). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1977
Plomer, Henry R. ‘The King's Printing House under the Stuarts’. The Library, new series, 2 (1901). 353–75
Pollard, A. W., ed., The Holy Bible. A Facsimile in a Reduced Size of the Authorized Version Published in the Year 1611. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1611
Purver, Anthony. A New and Literal Translation of all the Books of the Old and New Testament. 2 vols. London, 1764
Report on the History and Recent Collation of the English Version of the Bible: Presented by the Committee on Versions to the Board of Managers of the American Bible Society, and adopted, May 1, 1851. New York, 1857
Schaff, Philip. The Revision of the English Version of the Holy Scripture. New York, 1873
Scrivener, F. H. A. The Authorized Edition of the English Bible (1611): Its Subsequent Reprints and Modern Representatives. Cambridge, 1884
Selden, John. Ed. Frederick Pollock. The Table Talk of John Selden. London: Quaritch, 1927
Simpson, Percy. Proof-reading in the Sixteenth Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. London: Oxford University Press, 1935
Smith, Walter E. A Study of the Great “She” Bible (1613 or 1611). London, 1890
Sperber, Alexander, ed., The Bible in Aramaic: Volume Ⅲ: The Latter Prophets According to Targum Jonathan. Leiden: Brill, 1992
Ussher, Ambrose. Epistle dedicatory and first chapter of Genesis from his unfinished translation. Fourth Report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts. London, 1874
Wells, Stanley, and Gary Taylor. Modernizing Shakespeare's Spelling. Oxford: Clarendon, 1979
Westcott, Brooke Foss. A General View of the History of the English Bible. 1868. 3rd edn, rev. William Aldis Wright. London: Macmillan, 1905
Wheeler, G. W., ed. and intro. The Letters of Thomas Bodley to Thomas James. Oxford: Clarendon, 1926
Willoughby, Edwin Elliott. The Making of the King James Bible. Los Angeles: Plantin Press for Dawson's Book Shop, 1956
Wood, Anthony à, ed. John Gutch. The History and Antiquities of the University of Oxford. Oxford, 1796
Wright, William Aldis. The Authorised Version of the English Bible 1611 (Cambridge English Classics). 5 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909

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