El asunto Tornasol
Marshal Kûrvi-Tasch is dictator of the fictional regime of Borduria. Although he never appears as a character in the series, he is mentioned by name and glimpsed in statues and portraits in "The Calculus Affair" and "Tintin and the Picaros". His English name is an allusion to his curved moustache, which also appears as a stylised circumflex mark in the Bordurian language (an example can be seen in his name). Bordurians are often heard swearing "by the whiskers of Kûrvi-Tasch".