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The Smurfs

The Smurfs are the brainchild of a Belgian cartoonist Peyo in 1958. The original name and the accompanying language came during a meal Peyo was having with his colleague and friend. Having momentarily forgotten the word "salt", Peyo asked him (in French) to pass the "schtroumpf". Franquin jokingly replied, "Here's the Schtroumpf — when you are done schtroumpfing, schtroumpf it back..." and the two spent the rest of that weekend speaking in "schtroumpf language". The name was later translated into Dutch as "Smurf", which was adopted in English.

Pero first published a story about two boys, set during the middle ages, in a world of sword and sorcery. Johan, a brave young page to the king is joined by his midget sidekick Peewit on an adventure where they are looking for a magic flute. With the help of the wizard Homnibus they encounter tiny, blue-skinned humanoid creature called a "Schtroumpf" dressed in white who was followed by numerous other identical looking Schtroumpfs and an elderly father-figure dressed in red. The story proved to be a huge success and The Smurfs went on to their first independent story the following year.

The storylines tend to be composed of simple tales of bold adventures. The cast has a simple structure as well: almost all the characters look essentially alike — mostly male, very short (only 3 apples high), with blue skin, white trousers (with a hole for their short tails) and a white hat. Some Smurfs feature additional accessories that identifies a personality - for example "Handy Smurf" wears overalls and always has a pencil behind his ear. Being humaniod in shape, Smurfs can walk, jog and run just like us, but more often than not are found skipping on both feet. Their favourite food are "smurfberries", which are the fruit of a Sarsaparilla plant.

The average age for a Smurf is 100 years old (and not a wrinkle in sight!) apart from Papa Smurf, Baby Smurf and Smurfette. Originally there were 99 Smurfs and all of them were identical males (apart from the obvious stereo-typing of simple human archetypes such as Lazy Smurf, Brainy Smurf and Grouchy Smurf). Smurfette and Sassette came along later on and were creations of Gargamel and the Smurflings respectively.

Apart from their size and colour, the most noticable and memorable thing about Smurfs is their unique language. The Smurfs replace almost every verb and noun with the word "smurf" to form sentences like "We're going smurfing on the River Smurf this afternoon". Although the Smurfs understand each other its very difficult for us to follow so the use of smurf has been greatly turned down do be understandable by us mere humans.

When they first appeared in 1958, The Smurfs lived in a part of the world called "le Pays maudit" (which is French for "the Cursed Land"). To reach it required magic or travelling through dense forests, deep marshes, a scorching desert and a high mountain range. The Smurfs themselves use storks in order to travel long distances, such as the kingdom where Johan and Peewit live, and keep up-to-date with events in the outside world.

The Smurf village is made up of lots of mushroom-like houses of different shapes and sizes in a desolate and rocky land with just a few plants and trees. However, in the Smurf series itself the mushroom-like houses are more similar to one another and are located in a clearing in the middle of a deep forest with grass, a river, and vegetation. Humans such as Gargamel are shown to live nearby, though it is almost impossible for an outsider to find the Smurf village except when led by a Smurf.

The Smurfs don't use money to pay for things like we do but instead live in a cooperative society. Each Smurf has a particular talent that they gladly contricute to the Smurf society. In return, each Smurf appears to be given their necessities of life, from housing and clothes to food without using any money in exchange. Quite often they will "work for each other" by doing what they are best at. This sometimes leads people, incorrectly, to assume that Smurfs are actually communists.

Papa Smurf is the leader of the community and is skilled in making magical spells and potions. Other Smurfs are generally named after their personality disposition, for example, Brainy, Greedy, Vanity, Lazy, Clumsy, Hefty, Jokey, Dreamy, Grouchy, or their profession, for example, Poet, Actor, Handy, Harmony, Farmer, Clockwork, Painter, Tailor, Miner, Architect, Reporter, Timber, Barber and Doctor Smurf. Other Smurf characters include Gutsy Smurf, Grandma Smurf, Grandpa Smurf, and Smurfette.


Smurfette is a female Smurf who was created by Gargamel to trap and ensnare the male Smurfs. In the cartoon she originally had black hair, though this turned blonde when Papa Smurf worked all night to make her a real smurf. Until the creation of Sassette she was the only female Smurf in the village.

Brainy Smurf considers himself the most intelligent Smurf in the village and an expert on everything, although his actual knowledge is questionable at best; often, his attempts to help in a given situation leads to more problems. He is Papa Smurf's apprentice and assistant, and he often thinks that makes him the de facto second-in-command. He can be distinguished from the others by the large glasses he wears.

Hefty Smurf has incredible strength and often is seen doing a lot of the heavy work in the village. He also has a tattoo on his arm of a heart with an arrow through it. His favorite activity is lifting weights, and is often the one to kick Brainy out of the village. His best friend is Handy Smurf who is the best and building things in Smurf Village.

Jokey Smurf is a cheerful Smurf who enjoys playing tricks on the other Smurfs. His joke, a yellow and red-wrapped present box that he offers to his victims, saying it is a gift, that explodes when the receiver opens it. Dreamy Smurf is always dreaming of other places and other things. He is best known for his appearance as Astrosmurf (Watch it here), where he visits the fictitious Swoofs on their home planet.

Clumsy Smurf is a somewhat dimwitted but amiable Smurf. His best friend is Brainy. He is distinguished by his baggy clothing, which adds to his clumsy appearance. Greedy is an exceptionally gluttonous Smurf. He has an exceptional interest in eating cakes and other pastry. Greedy usually cannot seem to help himself, and he is often chased by Baker Smurf for stealing snacks and food.

Chef Smurf is the cook of the village. He knows dozens of recipes and cooks many dishes. He always wears his toque blanche (white chef's hat). Vanity Smurf just loves himself! He has a flower in his hat and he often holds a hand mirror, staring into his own reflection, which he kisses often. Scaredy Smurf, as his name says, easily gets scared by anything, whether it is a small insect or the noise of storm.

The non-Smurf characters who would appear later would include the evil Gargamel, his cat Azrael, and the page Johan, who went from print to film and TV. Johan appeared on the Smurfs TV series in the 1980s, and on the same show, Peewit became Peewee, Johan's young friend. Lord Balthazar is Gargamel's godfather. Balthazar despises the Smurfs and is actually more cold-hearted than Gargamel, in addition to being a more powerful sorcerer. He lives in a large castle whose moat houses a fearsome dragon called a Moat Monster.

The main antagonist or the Smurfs is Gargamel the sorcerer and he is the sworn enemy of the Smurfs. He is an evil wizard with limited powers. Gargamel is absolutely obsessed with the Smurfs and his two goals in life is to eat the Smurfs and trying to capture them to use them in a potion to make gold. His robe is worn and patched, and his teeth are rotten. He lives in a run-down hovel with his cat Azrael who also has a taste for Smurfs.

The Smurfs secured their place in pop culture in 1981, when the Saturday-morning cartoon series "The Smurfs" aired on Television from 1981 to 1989. The show became a major success and was nominated multiple times for Emmy awards, winning the Outstanding Children's Entertainment Series in 1982–1983. The Smurfs television show enjoyed continued success until 1989 and was known as "kiddie cocaine" for people growing up during the 1980s.