Learn Euro referendum speak

Say what you will about the European Constitution but at least this ratification process is a useful, albeit limited, education in the native tongues of our continental cousins.

The French could have voted "oui" but in the end said "non"; the Dutch could have said "voor" (for) but overwhelmingly sided with "nee" (no).

So what about the other countries on the list?

The Spanish are the only other country to have held a referendum so far, and they bucked the trend, voting si (yes) instead of no (er, no). But several other states have side-stepped the polling booth, passing the constitution through their parliaments.

So, Germany voted ja instead of nein, and so did Austria, where they speak German. Hungary voted igen instead of nem; Italy si instead of no, the Lithuanians taip instead of ne; the Slovakians ano instead of nie and the Slovenians da instead of ne. The Greeks... well, their alphabet makes it a bit difficult to spell out, and to add to the confusion, their word for yes is pronounced "ne" while no is pronounced "okhee".

A few countries have yet to ratify the treaty, but don't plan to put the question to the people. There's Cyprus, where they speak Greek and Turkish ( evet for yes and hayir for no), Estonia, where it's jah for yes and ei for no, and Finland, where it's also ei for no, and joo for yes (or kylla if you want to be more formal).

Sweden is on course to give the document a ja rather than a nej, Belgium is also "on message", with a Flemish ja rather than nee. The same goes for Latvia, where it's ja not ne and in Malta, the Maltese for yes is iva and no is le.

There are still a handful of referendums to go, unless, that is, the Euro chiefs decide to pull the plug on the constitution before it is battered with further no votes.

Next up is Luxembourg, with a referendum on 10 July. Locals speak French and German as well as Luxembourgish, where jo means yes and neen means no.

In Denmark, opinion polls have shown a slight edge for the yes, or ja, campaign, over the nej contingent. The Irish are entitled to vote in their native language, where sea means yes and nil is no. In Portugal the broad consensus is behind a sim (yes) instead of a nao.

Apart from the UK, that just leaves the Czech Republic (ani is yes, ne is no) and Poland, where one opinion poll in February found most people intend to vote tak (yes) instead of nie (no).