Origin of The Name California - The Name of California Is Applied

The Name of California Is Applied

The name California is the fifth-oldest surviving European place-name in the U.S. and was applied to what is now the southern tip of Baja California as the island of California by a Spanish expedition led by Diego de Becerra and Fortun Ximenez who landed there in 1533 at the bequest of Hernán Cortés.

Cortés, on his third journey of exploration (1535–36), tried unsuccessfully to establish a colony at La Paz near the southern tip of the recently discovered Baja California Peninsula under a royal charter granting him that land.

Hernando de Alarcón, sent by the viceroy Mendoza—an enemy of Cortés—on a 1540 expedition to verify Cortés's discoveries, referred to the inhospitable lands as California, after the imaginary island in Las Sergas, discussed above. There is no question about Hernando de Alarcón's use of the term, nor about his allusion to Las Sergas, but there is question as to whether this is the first use of the name to refer to those lands and whether he intended the name as mockery. Alarcón provides a clear link from the literary, imaginary California to the real place, but his usage cannot be proven to be the actual origin, in that the name might predate him.

Today the name California is applied to the Baja California Peninsula, the Gulf of California (also known as the Sea of Cortés or Cortez), the U.S. State of California, and the Mexican states of Baja California and Baja California Sur.