Polyglot (book) London, 1669), a monument of industry and erudition even when allowance is made for the fact that for the Arabic he had the great manuscript lexicon compiled and left to the University of Cambridge by William Bedwell. The liberality of Cardinal Ximenes, who is said to have spent half a million ducats on it, removed the "Complutensian" polyglot from the risks of commerce. The other three editions all brought their promoters to the verge of ruin. Subsequent polyglots are of little scholarly importance, the best recent texts having been confined to a single language; but at least into the early
Complutensian Polyglot Bible (volumes 1-5) from the copy in the Library of the Jesuit Society at Rome, and the rarer sixth volume of dictionaries from the copy in the Complutense University Library. The typeface devised for the Complutensian by Arnaldo Guillén de Brocar has been regarded by typographers such as Robert Proctor as the apex of Greek typographical development in early printing, before Aldus Manutius' manuscript-based typefaces took over the market for the next two centuries. Proctor based his 1903 "Otter Greek" typeface on the Polyglot; the Greek Font Society's "GFS Complutensian Greek" is likewise based on the Polyglot. Complutensian Polyglot Bible The