Estimate of the price tag for the first New Testament ever printed in German

Bible includes the Old and New testament. The 1522 edition included only the New Testament. “Luther Bible” by todd.vision is licensed under CC BY 2.0

In 1522, Martin Luther published his translation of the New Testament from Latin into German. Bound copies of the first and second printings were sold for 1 Gulden.

What would that be in terms of today’s money?

I infer a price tag of about $900.

After running out of 5,000 copies in the first and second printings, bound copies from the third printing went for 3 Guldens. I’ll guess that is roughly equivalent to about $2,700 now.

If you want to see more details, sourcing, and my calculations, check out the post at my other blog, Ancient Finances:

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *