Ulfilas

Ulfilas (ŭl'filus) [key]or Wulfila (wool'filu) [key][Gothic,=little wolf], c.311–383, Gothic bishop, translator of the Bible into Gothic. He was converted to Christianity at Constantinople and was consecrated bishop (341) by the Arian bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia. Ulfilas then returned to the Visigoths as a missionary; it was partly as a result of Ulfilas's work that the Goths became and remained Arians for so long in the face of triumphant Catholicism. Of Ulfilas's Bible only fragments remain—parts of Genesis, Nehemiah, most of the Gospels, and the whole of Second Corinthians, with several more fragments. Ulfilas is said to have invented the alphabet that he used.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

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