Love, war and church, three banal words whose meaning did not change with time. War  is the same old war known to be in use from the 12^th century: “Hostile contention by means of armed forces, carried on between nations, states, or rulers”

Love as we know it “A feeling or disposition of deep affection or fondness for someone” had, to my surprise, another meaning that was known during the 19^th century. ” Any one of a set of transverse beams supporting the spits in a smokehouse for curing herring” . However in the books Google scans it is mostly about love between people or the love of god.

The last word church “A building for public Christian worship or rites such as baptism, marriage, etc”  also kept its meaning.

I chose to write about those three words for two reasons: the first is the high frequency of their use in books between the years 1800 to 1900 compare to other words I checked like art, science, culture, etc. And the second reason is the interesting relationship between the graph lines of the words love and war.

When war (in red) is high love (in blue) is low and vice versa. The first peak of the word war  appears in 1805 at 0.03459977588%. 1805 is during the Napoleonic wars that lasted between the years 1803 and 1815. The second peak is indeed at the end of this wars 1815 at 0.0335997686%. At the same period the word love is at its low 0.0252718073% in 1803 and the second low in 1816. This interchanging relation is also happening in the 1870 when love is at its peak and war is low, historically this is just after the end of a few great wars that took place in Europe like the Crimean war that ended in 1856, the wars of the British Empire with other nations like Opium wars (ended in 1860) and the American civil war that ended in 1865. From 1877 until 1900 the two words are very close in frequency yet love is a little higher until the 20^th century when the story changes completely , see the graph below .

The frequency of the word church  behaves differently. It is very high,  even higher than the words war  and love words, until 1842 when it reaches its peak at 0.040051273380%.  A steady descend is taking place from this peak in 1842 until 1900 that gets me to conclude that the interest in church was apparently at its highest in the early 1800 . Looking at some of the titles Google scanned from the 1840’s, Christianity is represented on its various offshoot (Anglican, Russian Protestant, etc.). At the end of the century the word church, again on its various offshoots, appears less. The frequency of the word descends from the above 0.040051273380% to the low 0.0167875362% in 1894, and keeps descending into the 21^st century.