8.2 /10 1 Votes
Series Asterix Artists Albert Uderzo Language French Preceded by Asterix the Legionary Illustrator René Goscinny | 4.1/5 Goodreads Writers René Goscinny Date of publication 1967 Originally published 15 June 1967 Date 1967 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Followed by Asterix at the Olympic Games Similar René Goscinny books, Asterix books, Other books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Asterix and the Chieftain's Shield (French: Le bouclier arverne, "The Arvernian Shield") is the eleventh volume in the Asterix comic book series, written by René Goscinny and drawn by Albert Uderzo. It was originally published as a serial in Pilote issues 399-421 in 1967.
Contents
The book is inspired by the battle of Alesia, where the Gaulish warrior chief Vercingetorix surrendered to Julius Caesar. However, only the very end of the actual battle appears in the book - the main plot concerns what happened after the battle.
This episode, like Asterix and the Cauldron, is plotted like a detective novel, with a mystery to be solved at the very end.
Plot summary
The book begins with Vercingetorix conceding defeat to Julius Caesar. His surrendered weapons remain at Caesar's chair for several hours, until a Roman archer steals Vercingetorix's famous shield, which he loses in a game of dice to another legionary, who then loses it to a drunken centurion. The centurion himself uses the shield to pay for a jar of wine at a nearby Gaulish inn; later, the shield is given by the innkeeper to a survivor of the Battle of Alesia.
Following this prologue, Chief Vitalstatistix is made helpless by a sore liver. Having demonstrated this, and temporarily eased the chief's pain, the druid Getafix sends Vitalstatistix to a hydrotherapeutic center in Arverne to be cured, with Asterix and Obelix (and Dogmatix) as his escort. On the way, they stop at various inns, where the heavy food revives the chief's sickness. At Arverne, the Gauls initially remain together; but because Asterix, Obelix, and Dogmatix are in no need of special diets, they feast on wild boar and beer while everyone else eats "boiled vegetables". When other patients complain, Vitalstatistix sends Asterix, Obelix, and Dogmatix to Gergovia.
Along the way, the Gauls are offended by Roman envoy Noxius Vapus, and vanquish his guards. In the aftermath, Asterix, Obelix, and Dogmatix befriend the local tavern-keeper Winesanspirix, who retains them thereafter as guests. When Noxius Vapus makes his report to Caesar in Rome, Caesar plans a triumph on Vercingetorix's shield, and orders Vapus to search Arverne for it. When the initial investigations fail, the Romans send a spy, Legionary Pusillanimus; but on drinking too much wine at Winesanspirix's tavern, the latter discloses Caesar's plan and reveals his own knowledge of the shield's history, whereupon Asterix, Obelix, and Dogmatix set off in search of the shield themselves.
To that end, they interrogate the archer, Lucius Circumbendibus, who now owns a wheel manufacturing business; the second legionary, Marcus Carniverus, who worked at a health resort before opening a restaurant; and the drunken Centurion Crapulus, and vanquish the Roman search parties following the same trail. The search eventually leads them back to Winesanspirix, to whom Crapulus earlier gave the shield. Upon the protagonists' reunion with him, Winesanspirix confesses having given the shield to a dispirited Gaulish warrior, who is thereupon identified with the arrival of a newly cured and much slimmer Vitalstatistix. Upon Caesar's arrival at Gergovia, Asterix and the locals organize a triumph in which Vitalstatistix is carried on Vercingetorix's shield. Caesar then deports Vapus and his troops to Numidia, and Caesar promotes Centurion Crapulus to command of the garrison of Gergovia, and Legionary Pusillanimus to Centurion, on the grounds that they are the only clean legionaries present (the others having immersed themselves in charcoal belonging to Winesanspirix and his neighbours in search of him and the others). The Gauls return to their village (Vitalstatistix regaining his customary weight at the inns visited earlier in the story) to celebrate; but Vitalstatistix is forced into abstinence from the latter by his wife Impedimenta.