French really is ‘language of love’

PEOPLE speaking French are the most likely to be saying something romantic.

French is the language most often used to translate romantic expressions, ahead of other European languages a survey by Google Translate found.

It identified phrases in French, English, German, Spanish, Italian and Russian most frequently translated into other languages – and found that out of 1,000 phrases in France, 34 were of a romantic nature.

Perhaps an indicator that the French have more romances with foreigners than their counterparts, Je t’aime is the most requested translation after bonjour, and other high-ranking translations include belle, mon amour, magnifique, tu me manques, je t'adore and je t'aime mon amour.

Spanish is second most romantic language with 33 romantic phrases or words in 1,000, followed by Russian, Italian then German.

English is last with just 17 romantic expressions out of 1,000 translated.

In all languages “I love you” comes high on the list of translated phrases, at number one in German, second in Italian, third in Spanish and Italian and fourth in English.

You might be advised to not rely on an automated translator for your romantic conversations, however, as many French expressions have different meaning when translated. Je t’adore is not as strong as “I adore you” – only the classic je t’aime implies deep romantic love.

Meanwhile, you could embrasser a friend, as it means to kiss, like a bisous, rather than to fully embrace.

Nobody here claims to have invented French kisses, so you could call them baisers amoureux, or use the verb galocher, added to the dictionary in 2013.

You might prefer the more informal se rouler une pelle or snogging. This does not mean you are rolling shovels – pelle comes from the verb peloter, to paw.