Lovari speakers

Hungary c20,000 Poland 5,000 Germany 2,500 France 2,000

Lovari is spoken by the vast majority of Hungary's gypsies - or Roma - as well as by tens of thousands of other Roma throughout the world.

Translator Zoltan Farkas Vesho said he had aimed to use a "pure" form of Lovari, avoiding words borrowed from Hungarian, or any other language, so as to give the text the widest possible currency among Roma in the region.

There are already plans to distribute his translation outside Hungary.

Educational tool

Roma communities often suffer from a chronic lack of education, with high levels of illiteracy, and Mr Vesho hopes that his translation will have an educational value.

"Phrases used in the translation of the text can also be found at the back of the book in a dictionary section, through which the gypsy language can be learnt," he told Hungarian TV.

Cultural significance

Most Hungarian Roma are Catholics, and the Catholic Church has been spearheading efforts to raise their level of education.

The fact that it is written in one's mother tongue raises its value

Agnes Jovanovics

A Roma teacher, Agnes Jovanovics, said the fact that the Bible was now available in Lovari meant a great deal to the Roma community.

"It is a different case when people can read it in their own mother tongue, hold it in their hands and see that it is written in our language," she told the TV.

"I think the fact that it is written in one's mother tongue raises its value."

Hungarian Education Minister Jozsef Palinkas also expressed the hope that the bilingual presentation - the two languages appear on facing pages - would enable non-gypsy teachers to educate Roma children and help to forge better relations between the two communities.

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.