Polyglot (book) Polyglot (book) A polyglot is a book that contains side-by-side versions of the same text in several different languages. Some editions of the Bible or its parts are polyglots, in which the Hebrew and Greek originals are exhibited along with historical translations. Polyglots are useful for studying the history of the text and its interpretation. The first enterprise of this kind is the famous "Hexapla" of Origen of Alexandria, in which the Old Testament Scriptures were written in six parallel columns, the first containing the Hebrew text, the second a transliteration of this in Greek letters, the third and fourth
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