Beybel Sans, Cloth

This is the first time that the entire Bible has been published in Cornish. The single most important factor in the establishment of written vernaculars in Europe has been the publication of the Bible, for example, the Welsh Bible of 1588, O'Donnell's Irish New Testament of 1603 and Bedell's Irish Old Testament of 1685. The appearance of a translation of the Holy Bible has always been of crucial importance, since it is manifest proof that the language is worthy to express the word of God. Luther's German Bible (1534), for example, and the English King James Version of the Bible (1611), have both left an indelible mark on their respective languages.

The Old Testament in this translation is based on the English Standard Version of 2001, though the original Hebrew text was consulted in all places of difficulty. The New Testament portion is a revised version of Testament Noweth (Spyrys a Gernow, 2002), which was based on the original Greek text. There are many passages and quotations from the Bible in the remains of traditional Cornish. All such identified passages have been respelled in the present orthography and incorporated into in the translation below. Furthermore every attempt has been made in An Beybel Sans to produce a translation that was readable, idiomatic and internally consistent. The orthography used is Standard Cornish (Kernowek Standard) which is intended to be both authentic and unambiguous from the phonetic point of view.