The World Cup has been a lot of fun so far but a lot of people asked about a couple of participants that they didn’t know about. So we did a quick Fun with Maps episode on one of the teams, and countries, you may not know much about – Cape Verde. In their debut match against Spain, they tied 0-0, earning their first point in World Cup history. You may also hear Cape Verde called Cabo Verde which is Portuguese. It’s officially the Republic of Cabo Verde.
It is an archipelagic country in the central Atlantic Ocean off the coast of West Africa. Remember, an archipelago is just a group of islands. Cape Verde is a horseshoe-shaped cluster of ten volcanic islands (nine inhabited) and eight islets that constitute an area of 1557 sq. miles. These islands lie between 370 and 530 miles west of Cap-Vert, the westernmost peninsula on the Senegalese coast of continental Africa, after which they are named.
With a population of around 491,233 (as of 2021), Cape Verde is among the least populous countries in Africa. So it’s pretty impressive that they are in the World Cup. The name Cap-Vert comes from the Portuguese language Cabo Verde (‘green cape’), the name given to it by Portuguese explorers in 1444, a few years before they came across the islands.
