Imagine this: your beloved great uncle bequeaths to you an old book; so old that it is literally coming apart at the seams. You tuck away the tattered tome in the attic, where it will stay for decades. One day you decide to unearth the inherited manuscript and have it appraised. To your astonishment, your great uncle left you a highly coveted artifact that dates back to the 15th century. This biblio-fairy tale turned into a true story for one Sandy, Utah resident.

The discovery of the partial copy of the 500-year-old Nuremberg Chronicle left antique book dealer, Ken Sanders, flabbergasted. “You don’t expect to see one of the oldest printed books pop up in Sandy, Utah” Sanders said. It’s a long journey indeed; one that begins in Nuremberg, Germany.

Originally published in Latin in July of 1493 and referred to by Latin scholars as the Liber Chronicarum (Book of Chronicles), the text was translated into German five months later and called the Nuremberg Chronicle – a reference to the city in which it was published.  To honor its author, Hartmann Schedel, German speakers refer to the text as Die Schedelshe Weltchronic or Schedel’s World History. The pages describe a version of human history segmented into seven chapters or “ages,” beginning with the Biblical Creation and ending at the Last Judgment....