ROME: The Italians have Michelangelo, the French Moliere and the Germans Beethoven. But, according to an Italian survey, the British - the beer-swilling, tabloid-reading, supposedly sports-crazy British - are more cultured than any of them.

They go to more concerts, films, plays, galleries and libraries than almost anyone in Europe. They even manage to visit more ruins and monuments than the Italians. But the one area where they lag behind the other major nations of Europe is sport. More French, Italians and Spanish than British go to a course or stadium.

But the British are sportier than the Germans and, proportionately, attendances are above the average for the former European Union of 15 states. These and other findings are contained in a survey of European cultural consumption commissioned in Italy and due to be published next week.

Interviewees in the countries that made up the EU until its enlargement last year were asked if they had been to any one of a series of cultural events in the previous 12 months.

The British scored higher than the French, Germans and Italians in every category except sport. More than 60% of Britons said they were film-goers, compared with only 52% in the land of Renoir, Godard and Truffaut, and 49% of Britons claimed to have been to a library, compared with 27% in the homeland of Goethe. And almost a third of Britons claimed to have been to a gallery or museum, compared with barely 20% of Italians. -Dawn/The Guardian News Service.