Saint Jerome - The Father of Translation

Every translator and translator student should understand who Saint Jerome was and why he is regarded as such.

St. Jerome was from a place that now forms part of ex-Yugoslavia. He was born in the late 300s and lived until the early 400s.

The reason he is regarded as the father of translation, as well as the founder of translation theory, is because he was commissioned by Pope Damascus in the year 382 to translate the Old Testament into Latin from Hebrew rather than Greek. This edition of the Bible is referred to as the Vulgate.

In addition to this new edition of the Bible, Jerome translated other less well-known works and wrote many letters and commentaries regarding his translation work.

In addition to his translation work, he was the forerunner in translation theory. He was alone in his idea that translation should be "sense for sense" instead of "word for word."

This was not a popular theory accepted by translators at the time, especially biblical ones. It's a lesson that all translators should be reminded of today.

If you are interested in thorough biography on Saint Jerome and his work, you can read the St. Jerome article on Wikipedia.