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Hergé claimed that the basic idea behind the story had been given to him by a friend; biographer [[Benoît Peeters]] suggested that the most likely candidate was school and [[scouting]] friend Philippe Gérard, who had warned of a second war with Germany for years.{{sfnm|1a1=Peeters|1y=2012|1p=98|2a1=Goddin|2y=2009|2p=40}} ''Tintin'' scholars have claimed Hergé did not develop the names ''Syldavia'' and ''Borduria'' himself;{{efn|At first, Hergé named the country "Sylduria".{{sfn|Goddin|2009}} }} instead, the country names had supposedly appeared in a paper included in a 1937 edition of the ''[[British Journal of Psychology]]'', in which the author described a hypothetical conflict between a small kingdom and an annexing power.{{sfnm|1a1=Farr|1y=2001|1p=82|2a1=Libération|2y=2006}} Reportedly, the paper, by [[Lewis Fry Richardson]] and entitled "General Foreign Policy", explored the nature of inter-state conflict in a [[mathematics|mathematical]] way.{{sfnm|1a1=Farr|1y=2001|1p=82|2a1=Libération|2y=2006}} Peeters attributed these claims to Georges Laurenceau, but said that "no researcher has confirmed this source". Instead, a paper by Richardson entitled "Generalized Foreign Politics: A Story in Group Psychology" was published in ''The British Journal of Psychology Monograph Supplements'' in 1939, but did not mention ''Syldavia'' or ''Borduria''. In any case, given the publication date, it is unlikely that it was an influence on ''King Ottokar's Sceptre''.{{sfn|Peeters|2012|p=325}}
{{Quote box|width=246px|bgcolor=#c6dbf7|align=left|quote="At the time, Germany was of course on my mind; ''Ottokar's Sceptre'' is nothing other than the tale of a failed Anschluss. But one can take it to be any other totalitarian regime ... Moreover, isn't the villain of ''Ottokar's Sceptre'' called [[Müsstler]], evidently a combination of Mussolini and Hitler? It strikes me as a clear allusion
Hergé designed Borduria as a satirical depiction of Nazi Germany.{{sfnm|1a1=Thompson|1y=1991|1p=83|2a1=Apostolidès|2y=2010|2p=29}}
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