(BIBLE.
Polyglot). Psalterium, Hebreum, Grecum, Arabicum ...

Polyglot). Psalterium, Hebreum, Grecum, Arabicum & Chaldeum, cum tribus latinis interpretationibus & glossis. Edited and with Latin commentary by Agostino Giustiniani. Text printed in eight columns across double-pages in: Hebrew, (literal) Latin translation from the Hebrew, Latin Vulgate, Greek Septuagint, Arabic, Chaldee or Aramaic Targum, literal Latin translation from the Chaldee.
Title within elaborate woodcut arabesque and floral border. Title printed in red and black. Thirteen floriated initials. Printer’s device “PP” on recto of final leaf. Marginal notations. ff. 200. Trimmed, lightly damp-soiled, margins touch frayed in places with few neatly repaired, trace worming at few margins, small portion of lower margine neatly removed from title-page. Later calf, rubbed, rebacked and recased. Folio. Vinograd, Genoa 1; Adams B-1370; Darlow & Moule 1411; D. Amram, The Makers of Hebrew Books in Italy pp. 225-9.

Genoa: Petrus Paulus Porrus for Nicolo Giustiniani Paulo, 1516.


The First Polyglot Bible. The Second Book Printed in Arabic. The Only Book Printed in Genoa in the First Quarter of the Sixteenth Century. With an Early Reference to Christopher Columbus’s Discovery of America.
     “A monument of Renaissance typography, this Psalter was linguistically the most ambitious work attempted to date, and the first Polyglot work ever published. It provides the Psalms in five languages as well as a marginal scholarship based largely on rabbinic sources. The Arabic text is one of the first two texts and the first biblical text, ever printed in this language. The Hebrew types used in this book were apparently never used again.” See, B. Sabin Hill, Hebraica from the Valmadonna Trust, The Piermont Morgan Library (1989) no. 18.
     The learned Dominican Agostino Giustiniani, Bishop of Nebbio in Corsica, and later Professor of Hebrew at the College de France, devoted himself to the study of Oriental languages. He spared no expense in the preparation of this first polyglot edition of the Book of Psalms which was popular with churchmen of the age who sought Christological references in its lyrical, prophetic poetry.
     The “Scholia” commentary reveals considerable scholarship. Of particular interest are comments to Psalm 19, verse 4: “Their line has gone out through all the earth and their words to the end of the world.” On this verse the Bishop notes: “In our own times, by his wonderful daring, Christopher Columbus, the Genoese, has discovered almost another world and a new congregation of Christians. In truth, as Columbus often maintained, God chose him as the instrument for the fulfillment of this prophecy. Thus I deem it not improper here to refer to his life…” The lengthy note subsequently contains previously unpublished information on Columbus’s life and second voyage. Columbus died in 1506, a mere ten years before the publication of the Psalter.