Despite the constant prevision that e - books areset to kill traditional publication , our honey affair with the humble print book continues . Books have captured our imagination for centuries , leading to no shortage of record - breakers . Whether it ’s the retentive , smallest , or most worthful , here is a small library of Holy Scripture superlatives :
1. MOST EXPENSIVE BOOK IN THE WORLD
Philippe Kurlapski viaWikimedia Commons// Public land
harmonize toForbes
, Bill Gates possess the most expensive book ever sold . In 1994 , Gates paid an astounding $ 30.8 million ( calculate for inflation , that would be approximately $ 49.4 million today ) for Leonardo da Vinci’sCodex Leicester . This original script - drawn manuscript , compiled between 1506 and 1510 by the Renaissance polymath and creative person , is one of only 20 notebook computer by da Vinci still in macrocosm . TheCodexcontains sketches , note , and idea , all transliterate in his peculiar rightfulness - to - left “ mirror writing . "
2. MOST VALUABLE BOOK IN THE WORLD
NYC Wanderer ( Kevin Eng ) viaWikimedia Comons// CC BY - SA 2.0
The Gutenberg Bible is probably the most worthful book ( or type of book ) in the world . It was the first book to be printed ( c.1455 ) using modern moveable eccentric , a summons that revolutionized the book trade ( before that , all Quran had to be meticulously copied by bridge player or printed with woodblocks , a procedure that hire many month ) . Only 180 were originally impress , of which49 survive today ; of these , only 21 are utter . Nearly all Gutenberg Bibles are owned by museums , libraries , or institutions , but such is their rarity and value that if one were to get along up for vendue on the open market it would likelyfetch many million of clam .
3. FIRST BOOK PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES
pout and bangos viaFlickr// CC BY - NC 2.0
The Whole Booke of Psalmes Faithfully Translated into English Metre
, also jazz as the Bay Psalm Book , was thefirst bookto be printed in what ’s now the United States . About 1,700 transcript were printed during the 17th century by Pilgrims in Massachusetts , but today only 11 copies are roll in the hay to exist . In 2013 , it also became the mostexpensive book ever deal at vendue , after it was purchased for $ 14,165,000 .
4. LARGEST BOOK IN THE WORLD
Wagaung viaWikimedia Commons// CC BY - SA 3.0
The world ’s big book is not a book in the conventional sense , but a series of immense Edward Durell Stone tablets surrounding theKuthodaw Pagoda in Mandalay , Myanmar . The more than 700 marble tablets ( each one over 5 feet tall and 3 - and - a - half feet extensive ) tell the narrative of thetipitaka , the central text ofTheravāda Buddhism . When build around 1860 , the tablets ’ dense piece of writing was filled with golden ink and decorated with valued gemstone , but unluckily when the British invaded in the 1880s , the soldier looted the ink and gems .
TheGuinness Book of World Recordsgives a more standard type of book the book — they say the world ’s largest book is a 2012 school text on the Prophet Muhammad create in Dubai and measuring an telling 16.40 ft x 26.44 ft .
5. LONGEST BOOK IN THE WORLD
Madeleine de Scudery viaWikimedia Commons// Public demesne
go by give-and-take count , the foresighted conventionally bring out book in the human beings is generally said to beArtamène , ou le Grand Cyrus(Atarmene or Cyrus the large ) a17th - hundred quixotic novel by Madeleine de Scudery . The 10 - volume piece of work has over 10,000 pageboy and is 2.1 million password long ( to give some context , the famously meatyWar and Peacecontains only around 560,000 words ) .
6. SMALLEST BOOK IN THE WORLD
Simon Fraser University viaFlickr// CC BY 2.0
The world ’s smallest book is so very bantam it can only be translate using an electron microscope . Teeny Ted from Turnip Townwas write by Malcolm Douglas Chaplin and was printed using pure crystalline silicon by his brother , Robert , at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia , Canada . The 30 - page work measures 70 micrometres by 100 micrometres , and is so pocket-size it could match on the width of a human tomentum .
7. BESTSELLING FICTION BOOK OF ALL TIME
Charles Dickens’sA Tale of Two Cities , published in 1859 , is thebestselling novel of all time , move an unbelievable 200 million transcript worldwide . More recently , E. L. James ’ trilogyFifty Shades of Greyhas infract the100 million copies sell roadblock , and J. K. Rowling ’s Harry Potter series of books have sell over450 million copiesworldwide .
8. BESTSELLING BOOK OF ALL TIME
Anonymous ( photo by Adrian Pingston ) viaWikimedia Commons// Public Domain
It is safe to say that the Bible is the best - selling book of all time , as it has been wide judge to havesold over 5 billion copies . It ’s also been translated in its entirety into over 394 languages ( 2123 speech communication have at least one book from the Bible translated into that language ) and has been sold all over the world since the very first book come off the print presses .
