Name

Appears in 

Meaning

The capitol of Nuevo Rico in The Broken Ear

sans façon: without manner, rough and ready (Tintin, The Complete Companion)

The Crab with the Golden Claws

salad

The Secret of the Unicorn

saccharin: a synthetic sweetener, in dilute solution 500 times sweeter than sugar

saccharine: adj., of the nature of or resembling that of sugar, overly sweet, cloyingly agreeable or ingratiating

Cigars of the Pharaoh

sarcophagus: a stone coffin, especially one bearing an inscription

The train Tintin escapes on in Cigars of the Pharaoh runs from Sethru to Jamjah

see-through jam jar

Bonus trivia question: Who is the old woman?

Pickpocket in The Secret of the Unicorn

Aristides: (Aristides the Just) 530? - 486? BC; Athenian statesman and general.

silk: a smooth, lustrous fiber from the cocoon of the silkworm, Bombyx mori (Linnaeus), used to weave fine cloth

Cigars of the Pharaoh

snowball: a ball of snow, as for throwing

Flight 714:

Flight 714: in order to effect his devious plans, a criminal named Spalding works as the unsuspecting Laszlo Carreidas’ assistant

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes story “The Red-Headed League”:
In order to effect his devious plans, a criminal named Spaulding works as the unsuspecting Jabez Wilson’s assistant.

The Calculus Affair

snore: the noise made by some while sleeping

A hotel in Szohôd, Borduria. In frame 13 of page 49, the name on the sign is spelled Zsnôrr.

Tintin and the Picaros and
The Broken Ear

tapioca: food substance prepared from cassava, in granular, flake, pellet or flour form, used in puddings as a thickener, etc.

The Seven Crystal Balls,
Prisoners of the Sun

tarragon: an herb

Hercules: in classical mythology, Hercules was the son of Zeus and Alcmene, and had great strength.
When he greets his old friend Calculus, Tarragon lifts Calculus off the ground. He has, according to Captain Haddock, “A grip like a mangle.”

Land of Black Gold

Tel LSD

Thompson and Thomson see a hallucination of this city while driving through the desert.

tel (or tell): an artificial mound consisting of the accumulated remains of one or more ancient settlements, often used in Egypt and the Middle East as part of a place name

LSD: lysergic acid diethylamide, a powerful psychedelic drug that produces temporary hallucinations

The Calculus Affair

topolino: Italian for “little mouse”

Italians call the Fiat Cinquecento (city car) the Topolino
The New Yorker 12 03 07 p43

Topolino is also the Italian name for Mickey Mouse
Wikipedia article on minor characters in Tintin

The Calculus Affair

Torticolli, torticollis, and cervical dystonia are all names for a medical condition in which the neck muscles contract involuntarily in various combinations.

A. Torticolli is the name on an ice-cream truck parked outside Marlinspike along with a crowd of rubberneckers (gawkers, sightseers). Page 15.

The Broken Ear

tortilla: in Mexican cooking, a thin, flat cake of cornmeal or flour;
in Spanish cooking, an omelet containing potato and other vegetables (called in American cookbooks, a Spanish Omelet)

Land of Black Gold, The Red Sea Sharks

what is there? what is that?

Several Tintin Adventures

wag: to move about rapidly as in a dog wagging its tail. Presumably refers to Wagg’s tongue. In The Calculus Affair, Wagg says “That’ll give us a chance to have another chinwag together.”
Also, in British English, “wag” is used as a noun, meaning a wit or joker.

The Castafiore Emerald
and others

Signora Castafiore’s accompanist; Richard Wagner, German composer; also, Wagner is a character in Gounod’s opera Faust

The Castafiore Emerald and others.

drupe: a fruit with a skin, a pulp and a hard seed, such as a peach, a plum, or a nectarine

King Ottokar’s Sceptre

whisky tot
tot: A small portion of a beverage, especially a dram of liquor.

Destination Moon, Explorers on the Moon

wolf: a large carnivore of the dog family, Canis lupus, a favorite villain in folk tales and sayings, as in
“a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”
Wolff is also a common name of German origin.

Cigars of the Pharaoh (the well-known poet Zloty)

zloty: a nickel coin and monetary unit of Poland, equal to 100 groszy

The origins of “Alcazar”

By Alexander Deubelbeiss

Alcazar is the name of a revolutionary Central American Head of State. As you probably know, alcazar is also a Spanish word for an Arab-style castle, such as exist in the south of Spain. The word itself is a Spanish adaptation of the Arabic word for “castle.”

What I first heard about today, in a historical linguistics class, is the origin of that Arabic word: it is not an Arab by birth, but comes from the Latin word “castru” (in classical Latin it’s actually “castra,” the version with "u" is later and spoken language). Now the Latin word “castru” has entered the Spanish language in another, more direct way: there is the word “castro,” which according to my dictionary, is a type of Celtic fortified village. But “Castro” also happens to be the name of a revolutionary Central American Head of State...

Xander