New Sub-domains or New Directories for 10+ Year Domain?

[ipllc]

We've got a one-page, 10+ year old domain that has a 65/100 domain authority that gets about 10k page views a day (I'm happy to share the URL but didn't know if that's permitted).

The content changes daily (it's a daily bible verse) so most of this question is focused on domain authority, not the content.

We're getting ready to provide translations of that daily content in 4 languages.  Would it be better to create sub-domains for those translations (same content, different language) or sub-folders?

Example:

http://cn.example.com
http://es.example.com
http://ru.example.com

or

http://example.com/cn
http://example.com/es
http://example.com/ru

We're able to do either but want to pick the one that would give the translated version the most authority both now and moving forward.  (We definitely don't want to penalize the root domain.)

Thanks in advance for your input.

[AdoptionHelp]

You should put them in folders in order to pass your domain authority to them. If you put them in subdomains you'll have to start building their domain authority from scratch.

[RyanKent]

Would it be better to create sub-domains for those translations (same content, different language) or sub-folders?

You can safely use either method. For the most part it is solely a matter of your preference. Neither choice has a SEO benefit nor disadvantage when compared to the other.

If it was my site, I would choose to go with the subdomain approach as a means of separating the content. The site structure would be identical other then the prefix. It would be easiest to manage in my opinion.

But who am I? How about listening to Matt Cutt's opinion

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/subdomains-and-subdirectories/