The Old [New] Testament. Embellished with Engravings from Pictures and Designs by the Most Eminent English Artists.

London: printed for Thomas Macklin by Thomas Bensley,, 1800. The grandest Bible ever printed in Britain First Macklin edition of the Bible, handsomely bound. "The most ambitious edition produced in Britain, often pirated but never rivalled" (ODNB), this Bible is a masterpiece of book art, published at the apogee of British copperplate engraving and involving some of the best artists of its day. The Bible, dedicated to the king, was published serially between 1791 and 1800 in 70 parts, each at £1. 1s. Thomas Macklin (1752-1800) began work on the project in the year following the opening of his famous Poets' Gallery in Pall Mall. The prospectus, issued in 1789, explained that he was planning to add scripture pictures to his exhibition, to be then reproduced in a "magnificent Bible". The paintings were realised by several artists including Hamilton, Fuseli, and Loutherbourg, and exhibited at the Poets' Gallery between 1790 and 1796. Initially promising 60 plates, the project eventually included 71, some of which never appeared in Macklin's exhibitions. Most of the headpiece and tailpiece vignettes were designed by Loutherbourg, the type was cut by Joseph Jackson and his apprentice Vincent Figgins, and the paper made by Whatman. The Bible took 11 years to complete and the publication costs, exceeding £30,000, almost bankrupted Macklin. Though the final engraving was finished five days before his death, the last of the vignettes was not completed for another six weeks, and he consequently never saw the finished work. Some copies of the Bible were bound in a fine neoclassical style by contemporary London binders, particularly Staggemeier and Welcher. This set is unsigned, but the treatment of the spine appears closer to the work of Kalthoeber (see Maggs Cat. 1212, II, no. 164). This set is bound in six volumes, as recommended in the instructions to the binder (vol. I). However, sets are sometimes found bound in seven. 6 vols, large folio (458 x 370 mm). With 71 copper engraved plates after Fuseli and others, 113 wood engraved vignette head- and tailpieces. Contemporary diced russia, spines with raised bands, compartments lettered and tooled in gilt, elaborate gilt frames to covers incorporating foliate and flower tools, board edges and turn-ins tooled in gilt, leather inner hinges, marbled endpapers, edges gilt, silk bookmarkers. Bound with half-titles. A few trivial marks and light scuffs to covers, small cosmetic repair to rear cover of vol. I, superficial splits to a couple of joints, subsequently retouched and now firm, occasional foxing to contents and offsetting from plates, else clean and bright. A very good set. ESTC T123175; Herbert 1441; Lowndes I, p. 192. Maggs Bros Ltd, Bookbinding in the British Isles, Sixteenth to the Twentieth Century, Cat. 1212, Part II, 1996.