Dinis Dias

Dinis Dias

Dinis Dias was a 15th-century Portuguese explorer who sailed down the coast of West Africa, passing the Senegal River and reaching the Cape Verde Peninsula for the first time. In 1445, as Dias was beginning to enter old age and made the decision to take up exploring because "he was unwilling to let himself grow soft in the well being of repose", left Portugal and sailed down the West African coast, setting a new record by reaching a point about 800 kilometres south of Cap Blanc. This, the most westerly part of the African continent, he named Cap-Vert (Dias named it Cabo Verde, "verde" being Portuguese for "green", a reference to the lush vegetation in the area). Note that Dias did not discover the Cape Verde Islands, but rather the actual cape. Read more on Wikipedia

His biography is available in different languages on Wikipedia. Dinis Dias is the 255th most popular explorer (down from 224th in 2019). (down from 1,863rd in 2019)