Asterix and the Echo of Portugal’s 1974 Carnation Revolution
In the English translation of Asterix in Lusitania, a small but striking moment directly references one of Portugal’s defining historical events. A prisoner shouts, “Romans beware the carnação — one day it will reclaim your nação!” At the bottom of the panel, a note informs the reader that this is a nod to the 1974 Carnation Revolution, when soldiers and civilians overthrew Portugal’s dictatorship peacefully, symbolized by red carnations placed in rifle barrels.
Since all the Lusitanians speak with a Lusitanian accent in this album, what he is says of course is ” Romans beware the carnation – one day it will reclaim our nation!”
In the original French edition, the same scene is subtler. The prisoner cries:
« Oyez, oyez, maudits Romains ! Un jour nous reprendrons le pouvoir ! »
(“Hear ye, hear ye, cursed Romans! One day we will take back power!”)
Another prisoner responds wryly:
« Encore un jeune idéaliste qui croit qu’on peut faire la revolução avec deux “oyez”. »
(“Another young idealist who thinks you can make a revolução with two ‘hear ye’s’.”)
The reference to the recent Portuguese Revolução dos Cravos, is much less explicit than in the English edition.
German
The German translation handles it really well:
Prisoner 1:
Romans, at least give us a few cloves with our lentils!
Prisoner 2:
A young idealist who wants to start a revolution just over a few cloves.
The prisoner demands Nelken (German for “cloves”), which also means carnations — the flowers that symbolized that peaceful revolution in Portugal that overthrew the Salazar dictatorship.
The prisoner literally asks for spices for his food, but of course it is also an obvious reference to the Nelkenrevolution. Nelkenrevolution is how the revolution is called in German.
The revolution
The revolution took place on April 25, 1974, when disillusioned officers of Portugal’s army launched a peaceful coup to overthrow the long-standing Estado Novo dictatorship. After decades of censorship, secret police, and colonial wars in Africa, the Portuguese people had grown weary of repression. Yet the end came not through violence, but through flowers.
When soldiers filled the streets of Lisbon, civilians joined them, placing red carnations into their gun barrels and buttonholes — a gesture that gave the revolution its enduring symbol and name. The second prisoner in the story nods to this with his remark about flower power. Within hours, the authoritarian regime collapsed. Power passed peacefully, and Portugal began its transition to democracy.
The Carnation Revolution remains one of Europe’s most inspiring moments of liberation — a reminder that even after years of control, freedom can bloom overnight. For Asterix’s creators, who loved slipping historical and political references into their stories, the idea of a flower defeating an empire was too poetic to resist.
