600s–1300s: Early Attempts

• c. 670 — Caedmon creates poetic paraphrases of biblical stories in Old English.
• c. 900 — King Alfred promotes Old English translations of parts of Scripture.
• 1382–1395 — Wycliffe Bible becomes the first complete English Bible, translated from the Latin Vulgate.
  • Hand‑copied, illegal, and widely circulated underground.

1500–1536: The Reformation Sparks English Scripture

• 1526 — William Tyndale publishes the first printed English New Testament translated from Greek.
  • His work becomes the backbone of nearly all later English Bibles.
• 1535 — Coverdale Bible becomes the first complete printed English Bible.
• 1537 — Matthew Bible combines Tyndale and Coverdale’s work.
• 1539 — Great Bible authorized for use in churches under Henry VIII.

1560–1600: Competing Protestant and Catholic Translations

• 1560 — Geneva Bible published in Switzerland.
  • Hugely popular, full of study notes, used by Shakespeare and the Pilgrims.
• 1568 — Bishops Bible becomes the official Church of England translation.
• 1582–1609 — Douay Rheims (Catholic) translated from the Latin Vulgate.

1604–1611: The King James Bible

• 1604 — King James I commissions a new translation to unify the nation.
• 1611 — King James Version (KJV) published.
  • Draws heavily from Tyndale, Coverdale, Geneva, and Bishops Bibles.
  • Eventually becomes the dominant English Bible for centuries.

1700s–1800s: Standardization and Scholarship

• 1769 — Oxford revises the KJV spelling and punctuation, creating the standard edition used today.
• 1800s — Discovery of ancient manuscripts (like Codex Sinaiticus) fuels new translation efforts.

1881–1901: The First Modern Revisions

• 1881–1885 — Revised Version (RV) published in Britain.
• 1901 — American Standard Version (ASV) released in the United States.

1940s–1970s: Modern English Arrives

• 1946–1952 — Revised Standard Version (RSV) published.
• 1960–1971 — New American Standard Bible (NASB) released.
• 1973–1978 — New International Version (NIV) published, becoming one of the most widely used modern translations.

1980s–2000s: Contemporary Translations Expand

• 1982 — New King James Version (NKJV) updates KJV language.
• 1989 — New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) published.
• 1996 — New Living Translation (NLT) released.
• 2001 — English Standard Version (ESV) published.

2010s–Present: Digital and Study‑Focused Era

• 2011 — Updated NIV released.
• 2017 — Christian Standard Bible (CSB) published.
• Ongoing — Digital editions, study Bibles, and linguistic research continue to shape new translations.

⭐ In One Sentence

English Bible history is a progression from forbidden handwritten translations to a rich landscape of modern versions shaped by scholarship, archaeology, and the evolution of the English language.