Bible translations into Church Slavonic
The oldest translation of the Bible into a Slavic language, Old Church Slavonic, has close connections with the activity of the two apostles to the Slavs, Cyril and Methodius, in Great Moravia in 864–865. It was implemented at the Preslav Literary School, although it was attributed to Cyril and Methodius. The oldest manuscripts use either the so-called Cyrillic or the Glagolitic alphabets. Cyrillic reflects the Greek majuscule writing style of the 9th century with the addition of new characters for Slavic sounds not used in the Greek of that time. Glagolitic writing differs from any other writing system; it went out of use as late as the 20th century. The oldest manuscripts use the Glagolitic script, which is older than the Cyrillic. The oldest manuscripts extant belong to the 10th or 11th century. Church Slavonic versions The first complete collection of Biblical books in the Church Slavonic language originated in the Grand Duchy of Moscow in the last decade of the 15th century. It was completed in 1499 under the auspices of Archbishop Gennady of Novgorod (in office: 1484–1504); the translators/compilers of the Old Testament based their work partly on the Vulgate and partly on the Septuagint tradition. The New