King James Bible

Printing in the King James Bible

The characters and script of the King James Version may look very strange to those who read it. There are many typography features that stand out once you begin reading the Bible. The original translation was made before the English language was standardized, and thus many variations took place within spellings and punctuation. The original printing also took place when many printers took it upon themselves to expand or contract the spellings of words to conform the text into as even a column as possible.

Some of the most noticeable typography features that are noticed when one is reading the bible is the use of the long "s" within words which resembled a modern "f." The modern usage of the lower-case letter "s" was only used at the end of words. The printers also used the letter "u" for both "u" and "v" and vice versa, with the "v" being used for both "v" and "u," all dependent on how much space was needed to keep the columns as uniform as possible. The letter "j" was used in place of the lower-case letter "I" in some instances. There are also two different uses of the lower-case letter "r" which has no rhyme or reason to explain why they are used differently.

Punctuation was also used with a high rate of frequency. For instance, if a line was too long for a row within a column the word "and" would be replaced with the symbol "&" and vice versa if the line needed to be buffered to make it longer in order to keep the columns uniform in width. Printings that occur now remove most of the random spellings and punctuation usages, but it is still a variant of the way English is spoken now.

The first printing of the King James Version used a black letter typeface instead of the normal Roman typeface that was used in other printings of the era. The use of a black letter typeface made both a religious and a political statement, because the King James Version was meant to be read in churches, rather than for private devotion in the home. The King James Version also did not use illustrations within the volume; instead it relied on the first letter at the beginning of a paragraph or chapter to be historiated, which provided a bit of decoration, along with a decorative title page and the introductory page to the New Testament.

The original printing of the King James Version contained two prefaces; the first was a dedication to King James himself and the second was referred to as "The Translators to the Reader," which was a long narrative that recounts why the new version was made. This preface states that it was not their intention to make a bad translation (referring to the Bishop's Bible) good, but to improve it. Many reproductions of the King James Version that occur in the United Kingdom include the dedication to King James, whereas many reproductions from America fail to include it. The second preface is very rarely included in the reproduction now.

The first printing of the King James Version had a calendar, or a sort of almanac, and a table that listed the holy days and observances provided within. However, this material became outmoded when the Gregorian Calendar was adopted in 1752 by the United Kingdom and her colonies. Because of this, many modern reproductions do not bother with including the calendar and table. Each chapter or section was also introduced with a brief synopsis in order to make it easier to find a particular verse. Since the first printing, editors have freely implanted their own summaries or took them out completely.

The printing of the King James Version led to many strange uses of punctuation and characters. There are also a lot of instances where items in the first printing of 1604 have been altered or left out completely in later reproductions. Some of the differences that occur also are in correlation of where the reproduction is made.