A Latin translation of the Bible made by the scholar Jerome, a saint of the Roman Catholic Church, in the fourth century. This translation was the standard Bible of the Western world until the Reformation. Vulgate comes from a Latin word meaning “common,” because Jerome's translation used the Latin of everyday speech.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved.