60 Fun Facts About Asterix

In which magazine did Asterix first appear, on 29 October 1959?

Pilote. For the new magazine its creators first planned a strip about Reynard the Fox, learned a rival artist was already drawing one, and invented Asterix in its place.

In Asterix, which plant does the druid Getafix cut with a golden sickle for his magic potion?

Mistletoe. The detail is borrowed from the Roman writer Pliny, who described white-robed druids climbing an oak to cut mistletoe with a golden sickle and brew an antidote from it.

Every Asterix album opens in 50 BC with one village holding out in which French region?

Brittany, in ancient Armorica. Uderzo had lived there during the war and chose it; his co-author asked only that the village lie by the sea, so the heroes could sail off on adventures.

What are the four Roman camps around Asterix's village called?

Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium. Totorum, a tot o' rum, was coined to keep the joke of the French original, Babaorum, which is named after the rum baba cake.

What is the druid of Asterix's village called in the original French editions?

Panoramix. Most Asterix names are puns that only work in French, so translators coin new ones: English readers know him as Getafix, the druid from whom the village gets its fix of potion.

In the first Asterix album, which real Gaulish chieftain surrenders by dropping his weapons onto Julius Caesar's feet?

Vercingetorix. History and a famous painting have him lay his arms at Caesar's feet after Alesia; the comic drops them on the conqueror's toes instead, and Caesar leaps from his seat with a howl.

Why does Obelix have permanent superhuman strength?

He fell into the potion as a child, so its effect never wore off. Getafix refuses him any more, and Asterix and Obelix All at Sea shows why: a whole cauldron of it turns him to granite.

What is Obelix's job?

Menhir deliveryman. In Obelix and Co. a Roman economist buys every stone he can carve, hoping riches will soften the village, and the glut of menhirs ends up wrecking Rome's own economy.

What is Obelix's catchphrase?

'These Romans are crazy!' The Italian edition turns the line into 'Sono pazzi questi romani', a long-running Italian joke reading of the Roman initials SPQR.

What is the name of Obelix's dog in the original French?

Idéfix. Readers suggested the name in a contest run by the comic's magazine; it plays on idée fixe, an obsession, and the English Dogmatix puns on dogmatic while slipping in 'dog'.

In which album does Obelix's dog first appear, trailing the heroes all the way round Gaul?

Asterix and the Banquet. A little dog outside a butcher's shop tags along for the rest of the tour without the heroes noticing, until Obelix finally spots him at the very end.

What is the name of the chief of Asterix's village?

Vitalstatistix. He rides on a shield whose two bearers keep dropping him, yet in Asterix and the Big Fight he wins single combat against a pro-Roman chief with the whole village at stake.

In Asterix, which villager is usually tied up and gagged at the feast that ends most albums?

Cacofonix. The bard is trussed up so the village can feast in peace, though his voice has its uses: in Asterix and the Normans it teaches invaders who know no fear exactly what fear is.

From Asterix and the Magic Carpet onward, what does the bard's singing cause?

Thunderstorms, even indoors. From that album on his voice brings down rain, once inside the chief's own hut, and the plot turns on it: a fakir flies him to India to sing an end to a drought.

Which Asterix running-gag characters, first seen in Asterix the Gladiator, parody the adventure comic Barbe-Rouge?

The pirates. They spoof an adventure strip that ran beside Asterix in the same magazine, and are sunk so often that they end up serving as innkeepers and galley slaves to pay for the next ship.

In Asterix, what is the name of the village chief's wife?

Impedimenta. She finds her husband short on ambition and jumps the queue at the fish stall as 'the chief's wife'; in Asterix and the Secret Weapon the village women make her chief in his place.

In Asterix, old Geriatrix is a veteran of which battle, where the Gauls beat Caesar?

Gergovia. The 93-year-old elder never lets the village forget it: when his blood is up, he cries that it will be Gergovia all over again.

In Asterix, the fishmonger Unhygienix insists his fish are brought in from where?

Lutetia. He lives on the coast and owns a boat, yet has his fish brought in from far-off Lutetia, today's Paris, sure that it is finer, so it is never fresh and sets off many a village brawl.

Asterix's name puns on 'asterisk', but why did his writer want it to start with A?

To top alphabetical listings. His writer called a name beginning with A an undeniable advantage for the comics encyclopedias of the future, and the asterisk supplied one.

In the English Asterix translations, Roman names end in -us and British names often end in what?

-ax or -os, punning on taxes. The French original set the endings with Jolitorax and Zebigbos, 'the big boss'; the English translators filled them with Valuaddedtax and Selectivemploymentax.

In Asterix and the Black Gold, the druid-spy Dubbelosix is drawn as which James Bond actor?

Sean Connery. Dubbelosix, a double-O-six on Caesar's secret service, rides a folding chariot packed with gadgets and files his reports to Rome by carrier fly.

Roughly how many Asterix albums had been sold worldwide by 2025?

About 400 million: 393 million at the last count, more than any other European comic. Not everywhere, though: a US publisher tried three albums in 1970, found sales modest and gave up.

As of 2025, which manga is the only comic series to have outsold Asterix in collected volumes?

One Piece. Eiichiro Oda's manga has passed 500 million copies, but it has needed more than a hundred volumes to do it; Asterix runs second on about forty albums.

By 2022, Asterix had been translated into roughly how many languages and dialects?

About 110: a 2009 count found 107 and the publisher gave 111 in 2022. Not all are living tongues: schools use the Latin and ancient Greek albums to teach those languages.

How many copies did the first Asterix album sell in its year of publication?

6,000. Sales then multiplied with every new book, and six years later the ninth album sold 1.2 million copies in two days.

Which writer and artist took over Asterix in 2013?

Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad. Conrad was a late substitute: Uderzo's first choice to draw, his studio artist Frédéric Mébarki, withdrew a year before the new team's first album was due.

Which publishing giant took control of Asterix when Uderzo sold his stake in December 2008?

Hachette. Uderzo's daughter Sylvie attacked the sale in Le Monde, writing that it was as if the gates of the Gaulish village had been thrown open to the Roman Empire.

In Asterix in Corsica, which pungent island delicacy gives off fumes that blow up a ship?

Cheese. A Corsican chief unwraps one so ripe that the Gauls feel ill, then leaves it aboard when he swims for home; a torch later meets its fumes and the whole ship goes up.

For Asterix albums 4 to 29, what pattern did the stories' settings follow?

Even-numbered abroad, odd-numbered in Gaul. The two albums before ran the other way round: book two never left Gaul and book three crossed into Germania, and only then did the rhythm settle.

Where did Asterix's first writer, René Goscinny, spend his childhood?

Argentina. His family left Paris for Buenos Aires when he was two, and the move saved them: relatives who stayed in Europe were murdered in the Nazi camps.

Besides Asterix, René Goscinny spent two decades writing which cowboy comic for the artist Morris?

Lucky Luke. Morris had been drawing the cowboy for nine years before Goscinny, whom he had met as a young cartoonist in the United States, took over the scripts and kept them until he died.

What unusual feature was Asterix's artist Albert Uderzo born with?

Six fingers on each hand. Surgeons removed the extra pair when he was small, but his other handicap stayed for life: the man who drew Asterix could not tell red from green.

In Asterix and Cleopatra, Getafix keeps admiring which of the queen's features?

Her nose. The druid cannot stop praising it, and noses fare badly in this album: Obelix climbs the Sphinx for the view and snaps its nose clean off.

Which translator, with Derek Hockridge, put Asterix's French puns into English for over forty years?

Anthea Bell. Wordplay ran in the family: her father set the first Times crossword, and she credited him with the lateral thinking she spent on Gaulish puns and, between albums, on Kafka.

The 1960s UK comic Valiant ran Asterix and Obelix as Little Fred and Big Ed, recast as what?

Ancient Britons. Valiant moved the whole village across the Channel and billed its hero as 'the Ancient Brit with Bags of Grit'; the pair became Gauls again only when the albums were translated.

In Asterix in Switzerland, which Alpine flower must the heroes fetch to cure a poisoned Roman?

Edelweiss, the album's 'silver star'. A Roman tax inspector is poisoned by the corrupt governor he has come to audit, so the Gauls' druid hides him in the village while the heroes climb for the cure.

Which actor played Obelix in every live-action Asterix film until 2023?

Gérard Depardieu. Asterix was recast around him twice, three actors across his four films, until Uderzo and Goscinny's daughter asked for a clean slate and Gilles Lellouche inherited the role.

What was the first animated Asterix feature film, released in 1967?

Asterix the Gaul. It was made without the two creators, who disliked the result, blocked two follow-up films and directed the next one themselves.

The Twelve Tasks of Asterix (1976), the third animated Asterix film, was the first to be what?

Not based on any album. Its creators wrote it straight for the screen: Caesar sets the Gauls twelve Herculean labours, one of them getting a permit out of an office block built to drive applicants mad.

Which 1999 film first put Asterix into live action?

Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar. It stitched several albums into one plot and was billed as the costliest film yet made in French, a title its own sequel, Mission Cleopatra, claimed three years later.

What did the French press rename Astérix when it was launched in 1965?

France's first satellite. Officially plain A-1, it rode a French rocket up from a base in Algeria and made France the third nation to orbit a satellite on its own launcher; it is still up there.

Parc Astérix opened near Paris in 1989, three years before which rival?

Euro Disney, today's Disneyland Paris. Its arrival cost the Gauls' park a large share of its visitors that year, but the village held out: by 2023 only its neighbour drew more in France.

In Asterix and Cleopatra, the queen bets Caesar that her people can still build what in three months?

A palace. Caesar has sneered that Egypt's great days are over, so Cleopatra stakes her pride on it, and her nervous architect sails to Gaul to beg his old friend Getafix for magic potion.

In Asterix in Britain, what do the Britons drink every day at five o'clock before Asterix arrives?

Hot water with a drop of milk. When the magic potion is lost, Asterix brews a fake from some odd herbs of Getafix's; the Britons win anyway and adopt the drink, which turns out to be tea.

In Asterix, Obelix's little dog bursts into howls whenever he sees what?

A tree knocked down. He was drawn as a one-album gag, but readers noticed little else, so he stayed and was given a cause: his authors called him the only known canine ecologist.

In the first Asterix album, the potion Getafix brews for the Romans does what?

Makes their hair grow fast. The centurion wanted the secret of the Gauls' strength and got runaway hair and beard instead; the 'antidote' shopping list the druid then gave him was the real magic potion's.

In Asterix, the warriors of which people have names beginning with Mac-?

The Picts. Their hero MacAroon washes up on the Gauls' beach frozen in a block of ice; once he is thawed out in the village, Asterix and Obelix sail him home to his clan.

The 2023 live-action Asterix film sends the heroes east to rescue an empress in which country?

China. In The Middle Kingdom the emperor's daughter flees all the way to Gaul for help against a rebel prince in league with Caesar, and the villagers set off to free her mother.

In Asterix, a chief of which people sees boiling oil and dreams up fries?

The Belgians. Their chief spots a Roman heating oil and wonders about frying in it; the sight of some mussels later gives him the rest of the national dish, long before a potato had reached Europe.

As of 2025, which country's navy is supplied at sea by a converted container ship named Asterix?

Canada. A Quebec shipyard rebuilt a second-hand container ship, already named Asterix, as a stopgap while the navy waited for new supply ships; the yard's proposed sister ship, Obelix, was turned down.

Which Asterix album brought extraterrestrials to the Gaulish village?

Asterix and the Falling Sky. Uderzo meant it as a tribute to Walt Disney: the friendly alien looks like a purple Mickey Mouse and hails from Tadsilweny, the great man's name with its letters shuffled.

Which 2014 film was the first animated Asterix movie made in 3D?

The Mansions of the Gods. In it Caesar swaps legions for property: he clears the forest for a luxury Roman estate beside the village, hoping that smart neighbours will civilise the Gauls where force has failed.

In Asterix and the Great Crossing, a storm carries the heroes' boat to which land, where Vikings find them?

America. The Gauls take the locals for oddly painted Romans, and the Vikings who turn up, all names like Herendethelessen, carry the pair home as natives to prove a new world exists.

Before Asterix, Goscinny and Uderzo launched which series in Tintin magazine?

Oumpah-pah. The brawny brave was among the first ideas the pair had together, shelved for years before Tintin took it; it never matched Asterix, and they ended it early to give the little Gaul their time.

What is the druid of Asterix's village called in the German editions?

Miraculix. German readers nearly knew him by another name: the first German version, in a comics weekly, recast Asterix and Obelix as Siggi and Babarras before the albums were translated afresh.

In Asterix and the Normans, which villager is tied up at the final banquet?

Fulliautomatix, the smith who flattens the village singer at the first hint of a song, ends this album roped to a tree himself.

Who directed The Big Fight, the CG-animated miniseries that debuted on Netflix in 2025?

Alain Chabat played Julius Caesar in the 2002 Asterix film he directed, then switched sides for this series: in the French version he voices Asterix himself.

Which real band appears as four Briton bards in one panel of Asterix in Britain?

The Beatles turn up as four Briton bards in a single panel, where the heroes' British guide Anticlimax blandly remarks that they are rather popular in his country.

Which Spanish tradition does Asterix accidentally invent in Asterix in Spain?

Bullfighting: thrown before a wild aurochs in the arena at Hispalis, Asterix picks up a spectator's dropped red cloak, and the beast keeps charging it.

Asterix in Lusitania, the 41st album, sends the heroes to the land now known as which country?

Portugal: a Lusitanian asks the Gauls to clear his friend, a maker of the fish sauce garum, who stands accused of trying to poison Julius Caesar.