This Rare Misprint Of The Bible Is Worth More Than You Think

Anything with novelty can offer financial rewards to collectors. In publishing, it is rare for books with misprints to stay in the public sector long, according to The Richest. Most mistakes undergo corrections when the error is spotted, making the book with the blunder valuable to book collectors. Now, not all typos result in cash for the owners of the misprinted material. It depends on a multitude of conditions: the book, its popularity, and how rare the tome actually is.

Peter Harrington agreed that an error in a book won't increase its value necessarily. He points out that "The Sun Also Rises" is worth money because of certain factors: a small print run of 5,090 limited the number of first editions available and it is often referred to as Ernest Hemingway's best-rendered story. This book contains a mistake on page 181, where the word "stopped" sports an extra "p." The publisher corrected it quickly. Books with the error show that the copy was printed among the first — and that is why the book becomes valuable, not because of the misspelling. 

The "Great She Bible," from 1611, offers a similar circumstance. It is worth a great deal — not necessarily from the mistake it contains inside — but because it represents one of the first King James Versions. The Bible was found in 2015 at the St Mary's Parish Church in Lancashire, England by Rev. Anderson Jeremiah and the Reverend Alexander Baker, according to the BBC, in a cupboard where it had been stored.

"We were stunned to discover a treasure as rare as this," said Baker to the BBC. "We knew as soon as we saw the date of the New Testament it was a significant find." Dr. Jeremiah added: "It's amazing to think we are able to hold a book printed as the direct result of the command of King James 400 years ago ... This English language version of the Bible was created to encourage ordinary people to discover the Good News of Jesus Christ for themselves and it is likely that it was the book that first took God's word into many people's homes in this part of Lancashire."

The mistake involves just one letter, according to the Museum of the Bible, which said that in the King James Bible (see photo above) the section Ruth 3:15 usually offers the following passage: "He went into the cit[y]." The person it refers to is Boaz, a wealthy man who eventually marries Ruth. But in the 1611 Bible, the line reads, "She went into the cit[y]," referring to Ruth and giving the book its nickname, the "She" Bible.

But, sometimes, it's the little things that matter ... and that mistake, plus the age and rarity of the book, make the volume worth almost $7,000 today, reported the BBC. Just a few of these versions still remain, with the Salisbury, Exeter, and Durham cathedrals holding one as well as Oxford and Cambridge Universities.