Old Church Slavonic


Old Church Slavonic (Old Bulgarian, Old Macedonian, or Old Slavic) is the first literary Slavic language, developed from the Slavic dialect of Thessaloniki (Solun) by the 9th century Byzantine missionaries, Saints Cyril and Methodius. It was used by them for translation of the Bible and other texts from Greek and for some of their own writings. It played a great role in the history of Slavic languages and evolved into Church Slavonic, which is still used as a liturgical language by some Orthodox and Greek-Catholic Churches of the Slavic peoples.