Sep
12
2007
This article tickled my fancy. Apparently, the Church of England approved the sale of hundreds of old Bibles and manuscripts to John Thornton, a small bookshop owner in Chelsea, West London for 36,000 pounds. Thornton, in turn, resold the religious collection for more than 500,000 pounds and plans to retire to the country with his windfall.
The spokesperson for the Church said “that the deal was a ‘terrible shame’ but had been done to make room.” I guess the Church will have to hold a record number of bake sales to make up for this loss.
Via Galley Cat.
I can only imagine what must have been in that collection. I have a friend who collects material along this line and her treasures did not come cheaply. What she has is really cool; I’ve been able to hold an actual copy of Henry VIII’s Oath of Supremacy in my hands and attempt to decipher the signatures. I know that item alone cost several thousand dollars, and Great Bibles from Elizabeth’s reign run the same.
Since it was the pre-1800 collection I’m going to pass this info along to that friend. I have a feeling she’s going to go chasing after who Thornton sold the collection to in case there’s anything she wants.
…presumably the bookseller in question doesn’t feel CofE is the one true church and hence taking advantage of them might lead to toasty tootsies. Not the CofE does a lot of one-true-churching, so he’s probably safe ;)