A rare copy of the first English Bible is expected to get £35,000 in auction while its owner bought it for £1.25.

The New Testament Bible which was first printed in 1537 after being translated by William Tyndale was bought by the anonymous owner in the 1960s at a second-hand bookshop. Peter Selly, a senior specialist in books and manuscripts at Sotheby’s, said the owner “loves the book and has treasured it for a long time. He only realised its true worth in the last few months.”

“People have always had this idea of coming across a really valuable thing in a bookshop. This seems to have happened here,” he continued.

Selly added: “He didn’t really realise until many years later. He thought it was more interesting than it appeared to be in the bookshop, but it was only recently that he realised it was worth far more than he thought.”

The Bible’s translator, Tyndale was known to pose a threat to the hegemony of the Roman Catholic Church and was arrested and later executed after being accused of being a heretic in 1536. Copies of the Bible were burnt upon discovery until Henry VIII demanded English translations of the Bible to be published.

Peter Selly said: “It’s a remarkable thing to see the common tongue being deployed in this way.”

“It opens the Bible up for the first time … and a lot of these phrases would become embedded in the English language.”

“It’s not just the religious aspect; it’s the contribution to the English language. A lot of people have said ‘no Tyndale, no Shakespeare’. He transformed and had a great gift for the English language.”

He added: “Even though a lot of second-hand bookshops have been lost in the country in the last few years you can still make discoveries, but it’s harder because there are so few independent bookshops now.”

The Bible is expected to be auction at Sotheby’s in London on the 15th of July.

SU/HA