It's a record that doesn't seem to have made any noise. Original plate 43 of the Laurels of Caesarestimated at between €80,000 and €100,000, fetched €332,800 on 16 May at a Tessier & Sarrou sale devoted to comics. This little gem was dedicated by Albert Uderzo to Roland Buret, a Paris bookseller and well-known expert among comic book collectors.

The 44 plates of the Laurels of Caesarthe eighteenth Asterix adventure, were published in the weekly magazine Pilot from September 1971 to February 1972, before being released as an album. Initial circulation: 1.1 million copies. In this story, Asterix and Obelix are on a mission to steal Caesar's laurel crown following a stupid bet by their drunken leader Abraracurcix. Hurt by a series of contemptuous remarks from his Lutecian brother-in-law, Homéopatix, Abraracourcix has promised to make him eat a dish that he could never afford, despite his wealth: a stew flavoured with the crown!

But let's take a closer look at the plate - the penultimate in the story - whose original has just found a buyer. (Warning for those who have not read The Laurels of Caesar (The disclosure is in sight!)

The first thing that strikes you as you scan the board are the large, bold sentences, rather than the few close-up faces. "Caesar's laurels! echoes the title of the album. As for "By Toutatis! and "Hail [Jules] Caesar!"These are two of the most famous formulas from the Asterix adventures. This particularity must certainly have pleased the bidders.

The upper half (43^A) presents a scene taking place "in an alleyway near Julius Caesar's palace "We're still in semi-darkness, a kind of fog. We're still in semi-darkness, a kind of fog: the ideal atmosphere for conspiracy! The technique used by Uderzo is similar in part to that of pointillism, an artistic movement in vogue in the 1880s, of which Seurat was a master. The illustrator ofAsterix explained his method in an interview with Numa Sadoul (Uderzo the irreducibleHachette, 2019): "It's drawn, then folded with dotted lines so that it's not completely black, so that it looks like fog. [...] I was having fun doing it, because as well as the colour, I had to give the black a special feel...". Albert Uderzo made it clear that this idea was entirely his own, as his partner René Goscinny had not specified anything to that effect in his script.

A curious effect: the Roman slave Garedefréjus ("Caesar's laurels!) then Asterix ("I swear, by Toutatis!") seem to be shouting at a time when discretion is the order of the day. Unless they are just whispering loudly or, more likely, these phrases are being used to underline the importance of the agreement sealed between our Gallic friends and Garedefréjus.

The second half-sheet (43^B) is more classic. Apart from the gag in the final box (Asterix and Obelix have substituted a crown made of fennel for the real thing), the most striking feature is the group of characters above it: Redbeard, Baba and the other well-known pirates from the series. This is an allusion to an episode in the life of the real Caius Iulius Caesar. According to Plutarch, at the age of 25, Caesar was kidnapped by Cilician pirates for 38 days. After paying a ransom, he was released. During his detention, he had jokingly threatened his captors that one day they would be slaughtered one by one. The Cilicians did not take him seriously. But Julius Caesar put his plan into action: he had the band of pirates captured and imprisoned, before having them killed and crucified. Fortunately, our paper Redbeard and his pals took to the sea again and crossed paths with Asterix and Obelix on more than one occasion.