According to the latest calculation of Ethnologue, the African continent has more than 2,000 languages. The lexicography of this vast body of languages until the nineteenth century was very modest. Their codification in grammars and dictionaries increased dramatically after the Berlin Conference of 1884–5 formalized the process of the European colonization of Africa, and the history of linguistics of the African languages became a subject of scholarly attention in the twentieth century. Apart from the establishment of the Xhosa Dictionary Project in 1968, only in the last decade of the twentieth century were there considerable developments in African lexicography: in 1991 the journal Lexikos – the only journal in Africa devoted to lexicography – was launched; in 1992, the African Language Lexical Project (ALLEX) was formed (between the Universities of Oslo and Zimbabwe); in 1995, the African Association for Lexicography (AFRILEX) was founded, with Lexikos as its official journal from 1996; and, in 2000, the African Languages Research Institute (ALRI) of the University of Zimbabwe was established.