| Full name | Edson Arantes do Nascimento |
|---|---|
| Known as | Pelé; “O Rei” (The King) |
| Born | 23 October 1940, Três Corações, Minas Gerais, Brazil |
| Died | 29 December 2022, São Paulo, Brazil, aged 82 |
| Nationality | Brazilian |
| Profession | Footballer (forward); later diplomat and government minister |
| Known for | Only player to win three FIFA World Cups (1958, 1962, 1970) |
| Parents | João Ramos do Nascimento (Dondinho); Celeste Arantes |
| Spouses | Rosemeri dos Reis Cholbi (m. 1966, div.); Assíria Lemos Seixas (m. 1994, div.); Márcia Aoki (m. 2016–2022) |
| Children | Seven acknowledged children |
Edson Arantes do Nascimento — known to the world simply as Pelé — remains the only man to have won three FIFA World Cups as a player. That single fact, combined with a club career that stretched across nearly two decades at Santos FC and a global cultural presence that few athletes of any era have matched, secured his place as one of the most recognised people of the twentieth century. He was born into poverty, rose through Brazilian football with extraordinary speed, and died in São Paulo on 29 December 2022, aged 82, after a prolonged battle with colon cancer.
From Três Corações to Bauru — Childhood and the Roots of a Footballer
Pelé was born on 23 October 1940 in Três Corações, a small city in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. His family did not stay long. When he was still a young child, his parents relocated to Bauru, a city in São Paulo state, where he would spend most of his formative years.
Money was scarce. Pelé helped supplement the family income with informal work — shining shoes was among the jobs often cited — while spending every available hour playing football. Without proper equipment, he and his friends made do with improvised balls, including stuffed socks tied together. It was a childhood common to many Brazilian boys of that era, but Pelé’s natural ability quickly set him apart.
His father, João Ramos do Nascimento, known throughout his life by the nickname Dondinho, was a footballer himself. He played at a semi-professional level for smaller Brazilian clubs, and his influence on Pelé’s development was direct and acknowledged. Pelé spoke openly in later years about learning from watching his father play and train. His mother, Celeste Arantes, provided the domestic foundation for the family. She outlived her famous son, reportedly passing away in 2024 at more than 100 years of age — a detail covered mainly in Brazilian and family-focused sources.
It was Waldemar de Brito, a former Brazil international, who spotted Pelé playing in Bauru and arranged for him to travel to Santos FC in the mid-1950s. The decision changed the course of football history.
The Santos Years — Club Career and Global Reach
Pelé made his senior debut for Santos FC in 1956, aged approximately 15 or 16. He would remain at the club until 1974 — nearly two decades during which Santos became, in large part because of him, one of the most-watched club sides in the world.
During his time there, Santos won multiple Campeonato Paulista titles, back-to-back Copa Libertadores titles in 1962 and 1963, and the Intercontinental Cup. The club also conducted extensive worldwide tours, playing exhibition matches on almost every continent. Before global broadcasting or organised international club competitions made football’s top players routine household names everywhere, Santos took Pelé to the fans directly. Warring factions in Nigeria reportedly agreed to a brief ceasefire during the Biafran conflict in 1967 so that both sides could watch Pelé play — a story that, whether embellished or not, speaks to the extraordinary nature of his fame.
His goal-scoring record at Santos was remarkable by any measure, though the exact figures depend on which games are counted. The FIFA Museum credits him with approximately 618 goals in 636 official appearances for the club. Broader tallies — including friendlies, tour matches, and other non-competitive fixtures — push the career total far higher, with figures of around 1,282 goals in more than 1,300 appearances commonly cited. No single number is universally agreed upon, because record-keeping standards varied widely across different competitions and eras. What no credible source disputes is the sheer volume and consistency of his scoring across nearly twenty years.
Three World Cups — The Defining Record of a Career
Pelé made his debut for the Brazil national team in 1957, scoring in his first international match. He was still 17 years old when Brazil travelled to Sweden for the 1958 World Cup — and it was there that he announced himself to a global audience.
At that tournament, he scored six goals in total, including a hat-trick in the semi-final against France and two goals in the final against Sweden. Brazil won the championship, and Pelé became the youngest player to score in a World Cup final, a record that still stands. The footage of him collapsing in tears at the final whistle, being held up by his teammates, became one of the defining images of the tournament.
The 1962 World Cup in Chile brought Brazil a second consecutive title, but Pelé’s contribution was limited. He picked up an injury early in the tournament and played little part in Brazil’s progress to the title. The 1966 World Cup in England was a painful experience by a different measure — he was repeatedly fouled by opponents, suffered injury, and Brazil were knocked out in the group stage. It remains the low point of his World Cup record.
The 1970 World Cup in Mexico, however, is where many who saw it consider his greatest tournament. He scored four goals, including one in the final against Italy as Brazil won 4–1. The squad assembled by Brazil that year — featuring players like Jairzinho, Rivelino, Gérson, and Tostão alongside Pelé — is still routinely described as one of the finest international club sides ever assembled. Their football was attacking, fluid, and decisive.
Pelé finished his international career with 77 goals in 92 official matches for Brazil — a record that stood for decades — and retired from the national team in 1971. He remains the only player in history to have won the FIFA World Cup three times.
New York and Later Life
After leaving Santos in 1974, Pelé came out of retirement in 1975 to sign with the New York Cosmos in the North American Soccer League. The move was partly financial and partly a deliberate effort to grow football’s audience in the United States. His presence in New York transformed interest in the sport there, helping lay early groundwork for what would eventually become a much larger American football culture. He won the NASL championship with the Cosmos in 1977 before retiring for good that same year, with a farewell match played between Santos and the Cosmos at Giants Stadium.
After football, Pelé remained a prominent public figure. He served as Brazil’s Extraordinary Minister for Sport in the 1990s, using the role to push for anti-corruption measures in Brazilian football administration. He was also appointed a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador and served as a United Nations ambassador for ecology and the environment. His post-playing career was more substantive than the ceremonial roles often given to retired sports stars.
In 1999, the International Olympic Committee named him Athlete of the Century — an honour also extended by multiple media organisations. He was a key figure in FIFA’s selection of the 100 greatest living players in 2004. Football history debates around the likes of Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi often use Pelé as the fixed reference point against which other claims of greatness are measured. Those looking to understand how sporting legacy is constructed and discussed can find a useful lens at CEO Success Model, where achievement, influence, and enduring impact are explored across multiple fields.
Pelé’s Parents, Siblings, and Family
Pelé grew up in a household shaped by his parents and two siblings. His father Dondinho and mother Celeste Arantes were central figures in his early life. His younger brother, Jair Arantes do Nascimento — known as Zoca — also played football and had a stint at Santos FC, though without achieving the same prominence. His sister, Maria Lúcia do Nascimento, married into the Magalhães family; her husband was Davi Benedito Magalhães. Their children — Daniele, Débora, and João Paulo — are Pelé’s niece, niece, and nephew respectively, though detailed information about them is limited primarily to Brazilian family-focused sources.
Pelé was married three times. His first marriage, to Rosemeri dos Reis Cholbi in 1966, produced three children: daughter Kely Cristina, son Edson Cholbi do Nascimento (known as Edinho, who became a goalkeeper and later a football coach), and daughter Jennifer. That marriage ended in divorce in the early 1980s. His second marriage, to Assíria Lemos Seixas in 1994, produced twins — Joshua and Celeste — before that marriage also ended in divorce. He married Márcia Aoki, a Brazilian-Japanese businesswoman, in 2016, and remained married to her until his death.
Most sources agree that Pelé had seven acknowledged children in total. This includes Sandra Regina Machado, who was recognised after a paternity dispute, and Flávia Kurtz, also recognised in later years.
Death and Enduring Legacy
Pelé was diagnosed with a colon tumour around 2021 and underwent surgery and treatment in the period that followed. His health declined steadily, and he died on 29 December 2022 in São Paulo from complications of colon cancer, including multiple organ failure. He was 82.
Brazil held public mourning events. Santos FC placed his body at the centre of the pitch at Vila Belmiro, where tens of thousands of people came to pay their respects. Tributes came from FIFA, governments, former teammates, and opponents alike.
The debates about where Pelé ranks among the all-time greats of football are unlikely to end. What is harder to dispute is the historical singularity of his record: a boy who grew up playing with a stuffed sock in a poor Brazilian city won the World Cup at 17, won it again at 21, won it a third time at 29, and in between scored goals at a rate and volume that no one in the modern era has come close to matching across a comparable span. Whether or not a single “greatest ever” label means anything useful, Pelé’s combination of achievement, era, influence, and longevity of fame places him in a category that very few athletes in any sport have occupied.
