In order to put the breviary together following the pocedural Roman order of texts, Vitus had to have an exemplar in front of him, and it was a Roman breviary written in Latin. Therefore, one of the Glagolitic priests in Omisalj or on the island of Krk, had to be able to read and understand a text in Latin, and then at least partially, to make a flawless translation into the liturgical language of the Glagolitic priests. This was the old Slavic language in use in Croatia. The ornamentation in Vitus' breviary proves that he had a copy of a book in Latin in front of his eyes. From that manuscript he copied into his Glagolitic text certain Latinic ornamented initials.
Initials are the bigger and accentuated first letters of certain paragraphs that are more important.
When Vitus was shaping his Glagolitic initials, he used the same ornaments he saw in Latinic manuscripts. The initials and the few miniatures are drawn in feather, in black, red and yellow colors. Redactors of the texts of Vitus of Omisalj's breviary did not have to translate all texts from a Latinic breviary. Most of the texts had already existed in some older Glagolitic liturgical manuscripts. They probably had several Croatian Glagolitic breviaries out of which they copied most of the texts that were already translated.