or Slovenian language
South Slavic language spoken by more than 2.
2 million people in Slovenia, in adjacent parts of Italy, Austria, and Hungary, and in small enclaves outside Europe. The oldest Slavic text in the Latin alphabet , the Freising Fragments ( 0441; 1000), are written in a very early form of Slovene; the language is not attested again until the 16th century, when Lutheran reformers translated the Bible into Slovene. The language has a remarkable degree of dialect diversity considering the size of its speech area, probably enhanced by the country's Alpine geography and long period of domination by non-Slovene-speaking rulers.