Recently departed global icon Pele is to enter the Portuguese language as a noun.
The Brazilian icon scored over a 1,000 goals during his career with Santos, New York Cosmos and Brazil, and was widely regarded the greatest of his era, triumphing on three occasions in the World Cup.
He passed away late last year at the age of 82, which was met with a major outpouring of grief in Brazil, and across the world. Many came from across Brazil to pay their respects to Pele before the great man’s funeral.
According to Cadena SER, Pele is to be inducted into the Portuguese dictionary following a campaign from the Pele Foundation. They collected 125,000 signatures supporting the move. The dictionary definition for Pele is the following:
“Something or someone that is out of the ordinary, something or someone that by virtue of its quality, value or superiority cannot be equaled to anything or anyone, as well as Pele, nickname of Edson Arantes do Nascimento (1940-2022), considered the greatest athlete of all time; exceptional, incomparable, unique.”
Pele certainly qualifies as a cultural phenomenon in Brazil, and while the debate over the best footballer ever will rage on forever, his home country has little doubt.
