John Wycliffe

=== Middle English Bibles ===
{{Further |Wycliffe's Bible}}

In keeping with Wycliffe's belief that scripture was the only authoritative reliable guide to the truth about God, he is said to have become involved in efforts to translate the Bible into English.<ref name="walker">{{ cite book |last=Walker |first=Williston |title=A History of the Christian Church |date=1958 |publisher=Charles Scribner's Sons |location=New York |page=269 |asin=B00087NRC8 }}</ref> However, while Wycliffe is popularly credited, it is not possible exactly to define his part in the translations, which were based on the [[Vulgate]], if any at all.<ref name=dove/><ref name=kelly/>

In common belief, it was his initiative, and the success of the project was due to his leadership.<ref name="Matthew">{{cite journal |last1=Matthew |first1=F. D. |title=The Authorship of the Wycliffite Bible |journal=The English Historical Review |date=1895 |volume=10 |issue=37 |pages=91–99 |jstor=547995 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/547995 |issn=0013-8266}}</ref>{{rp|93}}  For the initial Early Version (EV), the rendering of the [[Old Testament]] is attributed to his friend [[Nicholas of Hereford]]; the rendering of some of the [[New Testament]] has been traditionally attributed to Wycliffe. The whole was revised perhaps by Wycliffe's younger contemporary [[John Purvey]] in 1388, known as the Late Version (LV).{{citation needed|date=January 2024}}

There still exist about 150 manuscripts, complete or partial, mainly containing the translation in its LV form. From this, it is possible infer that texts were widely diffused in the 15th century. For this reason the Wycliffites in England were often designated by their opponents as "Bible men".{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}