Three editions of the Bible in the Italian tongue appeared in the year 1471. The first bears the name of Nicholas Malermi, a religious of the Order of Camaldoli. The closing words of the Second volume fix its precise date: "Impresso fu questo volume nel l'alma patria de Venetia nell' anno de la salutifera incarnatione del Figliolo de l'eterno et omnipotente Dio, MCCCCLXXI, in Kalende di Augusto per Vendelino Spira". This version was subsequently repeated in new editions, and is still esteemed for the purity of its language, being described by the latest writer on this subject as written. "vel miglior secolo della nostra lingua" (Vercellone, _Dissert. Roma_, 1864, pag. 100). The Second Venetian edition of 1471, was printed "per Nicolo Jenson in calende di Ottobre", and by some inexperienced modern observers was supposed to be merely a reprint of the former text: it is, however, quite distinct, and the best judges of the present day are of opinion that this version is from the pen of Cavalca, a Tuscan writer of the golden age, who flourished in the fourteenth century. It is cited 160 times in the last edition of the Crusca (Florence, 1843), under the title _Volgarizzamento di Pistole e di Vangeli_, and some manuscripts of it are extant, which date back to the close of the fourteenth century (Curioni, "_Sui due Primi Volgarizzamenti_", etc., Milan, 1847; and Sorio in _Archiv. Eccles._ Firenze, 1864, vol. i. pag. 297). A. third Italian version appeared in Rome in the same month of October, 1471, in two volumes folio: many writers have described it as the version of Malermi; but Maffei, who diligently compared both texts, pronounced it to be a distinct and independent version. No fewer than eleven complete editions of these several versions appeared before the year 1500, and more than forty editions are reckoned before the appearance of the first Protestant edition of the Bible in the Italian language. Some of these editions, too, deserve the name of distinct versions, on account of various alterations and improvements made in the text, and all appeared under ecclesiastical sanction; thus, for instance, an edition of Venice, in 1477, bears the name of "Fratre Marino del Ordine di Predicatori, de la sacra pagina professore umile". An entirely new translation from the original text was made by Sanctes Marmoschini in 1538, and was reprinted in 1546. Another translation, which appeared in 1547, was remarkable for its poetical version of _Job_ and the _Psalms_. The translation of Antonio Bruccioli attracted still more attention. It was made "de la Hebraica veritá", and was ushered in under the patronage of the French monarch, Francis I., in the month of May 1532.