The first page of the first printed Armenian Bible, known as Oskan Bible in 1666.
In April 2012, the Library of Congress will open an exhibition in commemoration of the 500thanniversary of the first printed Armenian book and the first printing press dedicated to the publication of works in the Armenian script [Urbatagirk, The Book of Fridays, printed by Hakob Meghapart in Venice, Italy]. The exhibition will also celebrate the designation by UNESCO of Yerevan, as the Book Capital of the World, 2012.
Located at the Library of Congress across from the United States Capitol, the exhibition will display 50 items from the Library’s Armenian language collections held by the Near East Section of the African and Middle Eastern Division and in other custodial divisions tochart not only the birth of Armenian publishing but also the continuity and expansion of its literary tradition in the land of the Armenians and in its far-reaching ancient Diaspora. The magnificent collections of the Library of Congress, numbering at present over 144,000,000 items, are justifiably famous. In addition, given the extreme rarity of Armenian incunabula, that is, books published between 1511/12 and 1695 A.D., three items will be borrowed from public and private collections to augment the breadth and depth of the exhibition.
The exhibition will be mounted in the Northwest gallery off the Great Hall of the historic Thomas Jefferson Building. This exquisitely decorated space has been the site of several recent exhibitions such as the immensely popular Voices from Afghanistan. Its proximity to the Great Hall and the natural flow of traffic to it guarantees a steady stream of visitors to the exhibition during three of the busiest tourist months in the nation’s capital.
The exhibition will begin by displaying manuscripts and early imprints to
illustrate the natural evolution from the hand-copied to the printed book.
Fonts and engravings traveled from place to place in early printing, with European influences on display in both the printed and manuscript traditions .Armenians in the Diaspora published works on all subjects and in a variety of formats. Armenians in the Ottoman Empire published numerous works in Turkish using the Armenian script.
The manuscript tradition continued to co-exist with ex