The epilogue to this volume starts with a reflection on how the once very important normative model has gradually been replaced by a more empirical and descriptive paradigm. As the focus of translation studies is not confined to Western-European culture, the historical-descriptive approach to translation studies cannot be homogenous. Furthermore, it has to be noted that foundational issues or attempts to define the scientific statute of translation studies receive less attention now in favour of questions of a methodological and historiographical nature on the one hand, and the ideological and institutional dimensions on the other. Delabastita and Hermans notice in the contributions the following recurring questions: 1. What is the object of the historical description of translation? 2. Is an open approach, not constrained by one’s own culture and language use, possible? 3. What is the position of the individual, the idiosyncratic vis-à-vis an approach looking for order, conventions and collective behaviour?