NEW YORK, Nov. 16 (UPI) -- A copy of the Bay Psalm Book is set to be sold at auction, and New York City auctioneer David N. Redden believes it may bring in as much as $30 million.
The book, which is one of roughly 1,700 copies of the first book printed in English in North America in 1640, will be up for auction by Sotheby's on Nov. 26, The New York Times reported.
Redden, the chairman of Sotheby's books department and has auctioned copies of Magna Carta and the Declaration of Independence, said he expects the book to sell for $15 million to $30 million, as it is just one of 11 copies known to exist today.
Michael Inman, the curator of rare books at the New York Public Library, said the Bay Psalm Book is "not a particularly attractive book" and was "rather shoddily done."
However, "It's what that book symbolizes," Inman said. "These 11 copies symbolize the introduction of printing into the British colonies, which was reflective of the importance placed on reading and education by the Puritans and the concept of freely available information, freedom of expression, freedom of the press. All that fed into the revolutionary impulse that gave rise to the United States."
The copy that is up for auction belongs to Old South Church in Boston. The church, which owns two copies of the Bay Psalm Book, voted to sell the book to finance maintenance projects.
The other copy the church owns will remain in its collection.
