# Cameroon

> English word · Proper noun · IPA /kæməˈɹuːn/ · frequency rank #14,289

## Definitions
1. A country in Central Africa. Official name: Republic of Cameroon. Capital: Yaoundé. It also claims Ambazonia.

## Etymology
Borrowed from French Cameroun, from Portuguese Rio dos Camarões (“river of prawns”), a name given to the Wouri river estuary, in 1472 by the sailors of the Portuguese explorer Fernão do Pó (a.k.a. Fernando Pó), raving about the abundance of shrimps of the species Lepidophthalmus turneranus (the Cameroon ghost shrimp) in the river; camarão itself is from Latin cammarus (“lobster”), from Ancient Greek κάμμαρος (kámmaros, “a kind of lobster or shrimp”).

## Easily confused with
- **Cameron** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/cameron-vs-cameroon)

## Common misspellings (10)
`acmeroon`, `caemroon`, `cameoron`, `camerono`, `cameroonn`, `camerroon`, `cammeroon`, `camreoon`, `ccameroon`, `cmaeroon`

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/cameroon