The Bible Museum celebrated the late Queen Elizabeth II 70th Platinum Jubilee with a big display of our commemorative royal Bibles. It includes a special Bible published for the 2022 jubilee.
In our commemorative royal Bibles collection, the oldest Bible is from Queen Victoria's golden jubilee in 1887. There is also a memorial Bible for her death in 1901. The scarcest commemorative royal Bible is the one which was produced for King Edward VIII's coronation, which did not go ahead as he abdicated. These Bibles were printed in 1936 and almost all were repurposed for King George VI's coronation. We have several King George VI coronation Bibles, from 1937.
The first royal Bible in our collection was added in 1981 and was published for the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer. There are others in the collection, including those published for the wedding of Prince Andrew and Prince William. There are several for the Queen's coronation and others published during her reign for various anniversaries. Some Australian States distributed New Testaments to school children, for the Queen's coronation, which are also included in the collection.
