Collectors call it the 42-line Bible: most pages have 42 lines per column.
The Gutenberg Bible
“What was the first big book printed in Europe?”
Johannes Gutenberg was a goldsmith from Mainz. His great achievement was not a single invention but a working system: metal letters cast quickly and identically in a mould, an oil-based ink that stuck to metal, and a press adapted from the screw presses used for wine and paper.
His most famous book is a Latin Bible, finished around 1455. It runs to nearly 1,300 pages, usually bound in two volumes. In March 1455 the future Pope Pius II wrote that he had seen pages of it on display at a fair in Frankfurt, and that the lettering was so clear you could read it without glasses.
Somewhere between about 160 and 185 copies were printed, most on paper and the rest on vellum, a fine calfskin. Around 49 survive at least in substantial part, and only about 21 are complete. They are among the most valuable books in the world.
Printing spread quickly from Mainz across Europe. Books became far cheaper than handwritten copies, and ideas began to travel faster than ever before.
Look closer: Gutenberg’s business partner Johann Fust took him to court over money, and Gutenberg lost much of his printing workshop just as his Bible was completed.