In the backdrop behind this ornamental capital "E," an enthroned King Edward VI holds a sword in his right hand as a symbol of his authority. As attendants observe, the king receives a book from a kneeling courtier. The image echoes portrayals of King Henry VIII delivering the vernacular Bible to his subjects on the title pages of works such as the Coverdale (1535) and Great (1539) Bibles, as well as "King Henry VIII sits enthroned over Pope Clement VII" in this collection. The illustration also evokes the figure of John Bale, a radical English Protestant antiquarian and polemicist who oversaw the placement of a similar picture in his bibliography of British writers, the Illustrium Maioris Britanniae Scriptorum . . . Summarium [Summary of Illustrious Writers of Great Britain] (1548). Bale hoped that the image would earn him patronage under Edward. He shared exile with Foxe during the reign of Mary I. This woodcut appears only in the first edition (1563); "English Reformation under King Edward VI" replaces it in subsequent editions, beginning with the second (1570). The image also appears in folio Bibles that John Day published during Edward's reign. No Luborsky and Ingram #. JPEG file (185 KB).
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