Latest News #232
February 7, 2003

A STATISTICAL SUMMARY OF LANGUAGES
WITH THE SCRIPTURES

A summary, by geographical area and type of publication, of the number of different languages and dialects in which publication of at least one book of the Bible had been registered as of December 31, 2002 [A few corrections were made to our language databases and are reflected in this statistical summary.]:
 
Continent/Region
Portions
Testaments 
Bibles
Bibles, DC*
Total
Africa
207    
289      
151   
(26)
647  
Asia
218    
229      
126   
(27)
573  
Australia/New Zealand/
 Pacific Islands 
165    
207      
34   
(6)
406  
Europe
 110    
 33      
 61   
(47)
 204  
North America
40    
27      
8   
(0)
75  
Caribbean Islands / Central America / Mexico/South America
122    
249      
24   
(9)
395  
Constructed Languages
2    
0      
1   
(0)
3  
TOTALS
 864    
 1,034      
 405  
(115)  
 2,303  

* This column is a sub-section of the Bibles column – for example, there is a translation of the Deuterocanon for 47 of the 61 languages of Europe in which the Bible has been translated.