This Bible is bound in calf on cardboard.  The cover is embossed at the margins.  The margins of each leaf are ruled with double lines on the top, left and right margins.  Between the double lines of the top margin are descriptive titles of chapters, numbers of chapters, and names of books.

Front matter in this Bible includes:

(1) A lectionary indicating times of sunrise and sunset, feast days and saint days, Psalm readings and Old Testament and New Testament readings for Morning and Evening Prayer for each day of the year.


(2) Following this lectionary is An Almacke for xxxix. yeeres, which runs from 1603-1641.  The top of this page is missing.


(3) On the back side of this page is a table, To finde Easter forever.


(4) Next there is The Table and Kalendar, expressing the order of the Psalmes and Lessons to be said at Morning and Evening prayer throughout the yeere, except certaine proper feasts, as the rules following more plainely declare.


(5) Following this table is a section titled The Genealogies recorded in the sacred scriptures according to every familie and tribe with the line of our saviour Jesus Christ observed from Adam, to the blessed Virgin Marie.  By J.S. Cum Privilegio. 

This Bible includes the Apocrypha, between the Old Testament and the New Testament.  This printing has elaborate initial letters for individual books; e.g., that of the Gospel of Matthew shows Neptune taming the sea horses, which is strangely unrelated to the contents of the Gospel.  This printing contains a well-known misprint in 1 Corinthians 4:9, which was corrected in editions beginning in 1616.  This edition reads approved to death, while post-1616 editions have been corrected to read appointed to death, the phrase that had been used by Tyndale, Coverdale, the Great Bible, and the Bishop’s Bible.  It also reads straine at a gnat in Matthew 23:24, instead of strain out a gnat.  This mistranslation was probably a printer’s error.

Provenance
A handwritten note from William R. Longstreet, the donor of this volume and of a great many of the other items in the College’s Historical Bible Collection, was found inserted into the middle of this Bible.  It identifies this Bible as belonging to the second issue of the first edition of the King James Version, sometimes called “The Great ‘She’ Bible”, since Ruth 3:15 reads (correctly) and she went into the citie instead of the erroneous reading in the first issue of the first edition, which read and he went into the citie.

This issue is also sometimes called the “Judas” Bible because in Matthew 26:36 it reads Judas instead of Jesus in the verse: Then cometh Judas with them into a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit yee here, while I goe and pray yonder.  Curiously enough, an attempt has been made to erase the word Judas in this copy, but it can still be read.

In a continuation of Longstreet’s note, he says: This Bible reached Saginaw from Manchester England in Early Summer 1941 during Second Great War.  Longstreet.

History
Seventeen editions of the King James Bible appeared in its first three years.  The 1614 edition contained more than 400 variations from the 1611 edition (Price, 280).  From 1611 to 1640, 182 editions of the King James Bible appeared with there being only fifteen editions of the Geneva for this same period (Kenyon, 305).

The so-called final revision was printed in 1638.  The King James has been revised throughout its history, starting as early as 1616, some of which are mentioned in this exhibit.  There is considerable variety in the spelling of proper names: e.g., Isaiah/Esaias; Jeremiah/Jermey/Jermeias; Elijah/Elias.  Mythical animals like the unicorn, dragon, cockatrice, and arrowsnake appear.  For other problems see Lewis (35-58).

Explanatory notes began to be called for, and they began to appear as early as 1649.  Bishop Lloyd’s King James in 1701 was the first to incorporate Archbishop Ussher’s chronological system that set creation at 4004 BCE (Ussher died in 1656).  Following that date, Archbishop Ussher’s chronological system commonly appeared in King James Bibles, as one can see in many Bibles in the College’s Historical Bible Collection after 1701.

In 1762, the Cambridge Bible introduced 383 marginal notes into the King James, together with other changes (Price, 281).  In 1769, Dr. Benjamin Blayney introduced more changes into the Oxford Bible, including tables dealing with weights, measures, and coins.  As late as 1873 the Cambridge Paragraph Bible gave a list of variations from the text of the King James as it first appeared in 1611.  This list of variations covered sixteen closely printed pages.

Distinguishing Characteristics

The inside front cover has five circular geometric drawings that have been colored with watercolor.  There is also the drawing of a pinwheel and a heart, both of which have been drawn in ink and water colored. An inked inscription, done in an old English alphabet reads:  Edward Hodgkins, his Book, Sep.30^th, 1774.

There is also a note, written in pencil that reads: This is the 2^nd [???] y 1611.  See Royal Arms on leaf The Genealogies.  Assuredly this refers to the coat of arms of James I on the title page of the genealogy section.  James ruled England from 1603-1625.

The following handwritten inscription is found on the inside back cover:  John Fenton, Bird Street, Litchfield, Staffordshire, Hair Dresser.  Below this is a hand-drawn five-pointed star.