by Ilaria Vercillo
Biblia vulgar historiata di Nicolò Malerbi (Venice, 1493).
Among the treasures of the Casanatense, the Malerbi Bible stands out: the first complete translation of the sacred text into vernacular Italian. This version was very innovative, Leonardo da Vinci himself owned a copy in his library. The edition shown here is also special for its illustrations: in fact, in 1493 the printer Guglielmo da Trino specifically created a new corpus of woodcuts to decorate the text. The curious fact is that he had the blocks engraved in a smaller size, so that they could be reused in the printing of other editions and other texts.