Printed in Constantinus Lascaris, De octo partibus orationis, December 1501

About 1500, Aldus began to plan the publication of a trilingual Bible, with the Hebrew, Greek and Latin texts printed on three parallel columns. In preparation for it Aldus composed a short Hebrew primer and published it both independently and as an appendix to his own Latin grammar and Lascaris’s Greek grammar from 1501 onwards, using the beautiful Hebrew fount designed for him by Francesco Griffo of Bologna (d. 1518). Unfortunately the project, announced by his collaborators Justin Decadyus (in 1498) and William Grocyn (in 1499) and by Aldus himself in the Pindaro edition of 1513, was never brought to completion and all that remains of his dream is the Hebrew primer and two proof sheets for Genesis datable about 1501, now in Paris. Aldus’s collaborator Demetrius Ducas moved to Spain after Aldus’s death and was one of the Greek editors of the Complutensian Polyglot Bible printed in Madrid between 1514 and 1522.

The copy shown here possibly belonged to the schoolmaster and printer William Dugard (1606–62), before entering the library of John Moore, Bishop of Ely (1646–1714), and been presented with the rest of his library to Cambridge University Library by King George I in 1715.

Aa*.3.39(D), fol [o3] recto