Thursday, July 24, 2003
The Gutenberg Bible goes digital
The Harry Ransom Center at UT Austin (yep, the same guys who bought the Watergate papers) have put the Gutenberg Bible online.
In June 2002, the Ransom Center and IImage Retrieval Inc. of Carrollton, Texas collaborated on the digitization of the Center's Gutenberg Bible using the I2S Digibook 6000 overhead scanner. The project took less than a week to complete and resulted in nearly 1,300 digital images. For the first time, it is possible for the general public to view all of the pages from the University of Texas copy, including all of the large illuminated letters in volume I and the copious handwritten annotations, as well as other indications of the book's use in religious services.
One of the highlights of my last trip to Germany was a trip to Mainz and to the Gutenberg museum. The museum has the Gutenberg Bible, the original printing press, the original blocks etc alongwith a neat exhibit on the history of printing. The best part about the museum is that you can print pages using the Gutenberg press, using approximately the same techniques and paper used by Gutenberg himself. Highly recommended even if its some distance away from Frankfurt.
In June 2002, the Ransom Center and IImage Retrieval Inc. of Carrollton, Texas collaborated on the digitization of the Center's Gutenberg Bible using the I2S Digibook 6000 overhead scanner. The project took less than a week to complete and resulted in nearly 1,300 digital images. For the first time, it is possible for the general public to view all of the pages from the University of Texas copy, including all of the large illuminated letters in volume I and the copious handwritten annotations, as well as other indications of the book's use in religious services.
One of the highlights of my last trip to Germany was a trip to Mainz and to the Gutenberg museum. The museum has the Gutenberg Bible, the original printing press, the original blocks etc alongwith a neat exhibit on the history of printing. The best part about the museum is that you can print pages using the Gutenberg press, using approximately the same techniques and paper used by Gutenberg himself. Highly recommended even if its some distance away from Frankfurt.
