This is a list of California county name etymologies. Most of California's counties were named by Spanish explorers, often for a Roman Catholic saint whose feast day intersected with the advance into a new part of Alta California. Native American names are also represented, with a smattering of counties named for local figures from the early American era. Many counties are named after Spanish missions.
- Alameda County: alameda is Spanish for an avenue shaded by trees or a cottonwood grove.
- Alpine County: Alpine is named for its location high in the Sierra Nevada mountains.
- Amador County: Amador is named for Jose Maria Amador, a soldier, rancher and miner. In 1848, Amador, with several Native Americans, established a successful gold mining camp near the present town of Amador City. In Spanish, the word amador means "one who loves."
- Butte County: Butte is named for the Marysville or Sutter Buttes.
- Calaveras County: Calaveras is named for the Spanish word meaning skulls, reportedly for the bones of fighters left behind after an Indian war that were discovered by Captain Gabriel Moraga.
- Colusa County: Colusa is named for a Native American word; the meaning is unknown. The word is derived from the name of a Native American tribe living on the west side of the Sacramento River.
- Contra Costa County: Contra Costa is named for the Spanish word meaning opposite coast or other coast, from its originally being opposite San Francisco (the eventual subdivision of Alameda County out of Contra Costa made this original meaning incorrect).
- Del Norte County: Del Norte is named for the Spanish word for of the north, due to its location in the northwestern corner of California.
- El Dorado County: El Dorado is named for the Spanish word for the gilded man; the name for this county in Gold Country references the gold-laden El Dorado of legend.
- Fresno County: Fresno is named for the Spanish word meaning ash tree.
- Glenn County: Glenn is named for Hugh J. Glenn, a 19th century California agri-baron.
- Humboldt County: Humboldt is named for Alexander von Humboldt, the Prussian explorer.
- Imperial County: Imperial is named for the Imperial Land Company.
- Inyo County: Inyo is named for the Inyo Native American tribe. The meaning of the word inyo is "dwelling place of the great spirit."
- Kern County: Kern is named after the Kern River, which is named in turn for Edward M. Kern, a topographer who accompanied John C. Frémont on an early expedition through the state.
- Kings County: Kings is named for the Kings River – Rio de los Santos Reyes (River of the Holy Kings) to honor the Biblical Magi.
- Lake County: Lake is named for Clear Lake.
- Lassen County: Lassen is named for Peter Lassen, a miner.
- Los Angeles County: Los Angeles is named for the fact that Gaspar de Portolà's explorers reached what was then the Native American village of Yangna on August 2, 1769, the feast day of Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula.
- Madera County: Madera is Spanish for wood or timber, after the heavily forested the eastern areas of the county
- Marin County: Marin is possibly named for El Marinero (the sailor), a Native American who ran a ferry in the bay for any years. El Marinero died at the Mission San Rafael in 1834. Another possibility is that of Chief Marin, a Coastal Miwok native, who was named "Marin", from the Spanish word for sea, for his sailing abilities.
- Mariposa County: Mariposa is named for the Spanish word for butterfly; Spanish explorers named it for the swarms of butterflies that alighted in the county each fall.
- Mendocino County: Mendocino is named for Antonio de Mendoza, first Viceroy of New Spain.
- Merced County: Merced is named for the Spanish word for mercy, and was named by Spanish explorers in gratitude for water of the Merced River, which was found after a dry 40-mile trek.
- Modoc County: Modoc is named for the Modoc Native American tribe. One historian suggests that the word modoc means "the head of the river." Another states that the word is derived from the Klamath word moatakni meaning "southerners," i.e., the people living south of the Klamath tribe.
- Mono County: Mono is named for a corruption of the Monache Native American tribe.
- Monterey County: Monterey is named for Gaspar de Zúñiga y Acevedo, Count of Monterrey, at that time Viceroy of Mexico. Monterrey, Monterey or Monte Rey, as it is variously spelled means King's wood or King's mountain in Spanish.
- Napa County: Napa is named for the extinct Napá Native American tribe. All members of the tribe were killed by a smallpox epidemic in 1838. The word napa has been variously translated as grizzly bear, house, motherland or fish. Of the many explanations of the name's origin, the most plausible seems to be that it is derived from the Patwin word napo, meaning house.
- Nevada County: nevada is Spanish for snowy.
- Orange County: Orange is named for the orange groves which were once plentiful in the area.
- Placer County: Placer is probably named for placer mining. The name derives from Spanish, placera, meaning "alluvial sand."
- Plumas County: Plumas is named for the Spanish word for feathers. It derives its name from the Spanish words for the Feather River (Rio de las Plumas), which flows through the county.
- Riverside County: Riverside is named for the city of Riverside, which is named for the nearby Santa Ana River.
- Sacramento County: Sacramento means "holy sacrament" in Spanish.
- San Benito County: San Benito is named for San Benito Creek.
- San Bernardino County: San Bernardino is named for the Spanish name for Saint Bernard.
- San Diego County: The county was named after San Diego Bay, which had been rechristened by Sebastián Vizcaíno in 1602, in honor of the Franciscan, San Diego de Alcalá de Henares, whose name was borne by his flagship.
- San Francisco County: San Francisco is named for San Francisco Bay, which was the first feature with this name in the region, and Mission San Francisco de Asís.
- San Joaquin County: San Joaquin County is named for the Spanish name of Joachim.
- San Luis Obispo County: San Luis Obispo is named for Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa, which in turn was named for Saint Louis, Bishop of Toulouse.
- San Mateo County: San Mateo is named for the Spanish name for the Apostle Saint Matthew.
- Santa Barbara County: Santa Barbara is named for Saint Barbara, patroness of fire.
- Santa Clara County: Santa Clara is named for Mission Santa Clara, which was in turn named for Saint Clare of Assisi.
- Santa Cruz County: Santa Cruz is named for the Spanish words meaning holy cross.
- Shasta County: Shasta is named for an unknown, but possibly Native American, origin.
- Sierra County: Sierra is named for the Spanish word meaning saw or saw-toothed mountains.
- Siskiyou County: Siskiyou is named for a Native American word; the meaning is unknown. One version is that it is the Chinook Jargon word for "bob-tailed horse." Another version, given in an argument before the State Senate in 1852, is that the French name Six Callieux, meaning "six-stones," was given to a ford on the Umpqua River by Michel La Frambeau and a party of Hudson's Bay Company company trappers in 1832, because six large stones or rocks lay in the river where they crossed.
- Solano County: Solano is named for the Native American Chief Francisco Solano known as Sem Yeto or Sum-Yet-Ho in his own language who was given the Spanish name of the Spanish Francis Solanus, who became a famous missionary. The chief assisted Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo in battle and politics with other natives.
- Sonoma County: Sonoma is a Chocuyen Indian name translated by some as "Valley of the Moon" and by others as "land or tribe of the Chief Nose."
- Stanislaus County: Stanislaus may be named for a Christianized Native American known as Estanislao or for Saint Stanislaus.
- Sutter County: Sutter is named for John Sutter of Sutter's Mill fame.
- Tehama County: The county is named for the City of Tehama. Suggested possible roots are the Arabic word tehama ("hot low-lands"), the Spanish word tejamanil (shingle), or "high water" in the dialect of local Native Americans.
- Trinity County: Trinity is named for Trinidad Bay which was discovered by Bruno Ezeta on Trinity Sunday in 1775.
- Tulare County: Tulare is named for the Spanish word for place of tules or rushes, aka cattails.
- Tuolumne County: Tuolumne is named for a Native American word that probably means people of the caves.
- Ventura County: Ventura is named for Mission San Buenaventura.
- Yolo County: Yolo is named for the Yolo Native Americans, a Patwin tribe. Yolo is a Native American name variously believed to be a corruption of Yo-loy meaning a place abounding in rushes or of the name of the chief, Yodo, or of the village of Yodoi.
- Yuba County: Yuba is named for possibly a corruption of the Spanish word uvas (grapes), wild grapes having grown abundantly in the area. Alternately, it may be a Native American tribe of the Maidu people named Yu-ba.
See also
References
- Sanchez, Nellie Van de Grift (1914). Spanish and Indian Place Names of California: Their Meaning and Their Romance. San Francisco: A.M. Robertson. OCLC 4268886. http://books.google.com/books?id=gKgYAAAAIAAJ&printsec=titlepage.
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