Eliot’s Indian Bible
At the age of 42, John Eliot, pastor of a church at Roxbury, Mass., began the study of the Natick Indian dialect, with a view of translating the Bible into that language. He completed the translation in 1658, after a labor of eight years, and the book was issued in 1663. Upwards of one thousand copies were printed, of which twenty copies were dedicated to King Charles. The latter copies are so rare that one of them was sold in the U. S., in 1862, for $1000, and six years later for $1150. Among the many points of interest which Eliot’s Indian Bible possesses, not the least is the fact that it is the language of a nation no longer in existence, and is almost the only monument of the race; another, that it is the first edition of the Bible published in this country.