The Elizabethan Bible made of calfskin will be displayed at an exhibition in Yekaterinburg (PHOTO)

      The Elizabethan Bible made of calfskin will be displayed at an exhibition in Yekaterinburg (PHOTO)

      April 21, 2026 The Museum of History of Yekaterinburg, in anticipation of the Night of Museums, presents a new project - the exhibition "Not Just Letters," the press service of the cultural institution reported.

      The exhibition "Not Just Letters" is dedicated to the formation and development of the book industry in Yekaterinburg, including printing houses, libraries, bookstores, and binding workshops.

      Yekaterinburg, founded during the reign of Peter I and being a product of his era, consistently embodied the ideas of the Enlightenment. By the mid-eighteenth century, literacy among the children of craftsmen and officers approached 100%.

      This was facilitated by the composition of the population (from specialist contractors and officers to Old Believers) and the system of mining education established by the city's founder, Vasily Tatishchev - Latin, German, verbal, and arithmetic schools were in operation.

      The first established book collection was the library of the Office of the Main Administration of Siberian and Kazan Factories. Its emergence was preceded by small private collections: books were brought to Yekaterinburg by officials and officers assigned to the Urals, as well as teachers, clergymen, and pharmacists.

      The largest private book collection in Yekaterinburg in the 18th century is considered to be the personal library of Vasily Tatishchev himself, which he later transferred to the mining department. From this point, the exhibition begins, sequentially leading through all the addresses of book Yekaterinburg until the early 20th century.

      The central exhibit of the exhibition is an ancient folio from 1751, namely the Elizabethan Bible, published during the reign of Elizabeth Petrovna, the youngest daughter of Peter I and Catherine I. The cover consists of wooden boards covered with calfskin.

      This is the synodal translation of the Holy Scriptures into Church Slavonic. It is still used, with minor corrections, in the Russian Orthodox Church as the authorized text for worship.

      The Bible came to the museum with significant losses. The first and last pages of the book suffered the most. The restoration of the book was carried out by specialists over seven years. This work, conducted from 2015 to 2022, involved specialists from UrFU, the Sverdlovsk Regional Museum of Local Lore, and the V.G. Belinsky Library.

      The edition opens with a portrait of Elizabeth surrounded by her royal parents and includes a total of 52 engravings on biblical themes.

      The exhibition "Not Just Letters" can be visited at the "House of Kachka" (Karl Liebknecht, 26) from April 24 with an entrance ticket to the museum.

      This year, the Night of Museums will take place in Yekaterinburg on May 16 and will be the 20th in a row. In turn, the exhibition at the MIE will be one of the elements of the 30th All-Russian Library Congress, which is scheduled to take place in Yekaterinburg from May 18 to 22.