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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (March 1, 1884)
THE WEST SHORE. 62 ORIGIN OP "CALIFORNIA" AND " OREGON." i BOUT the source from which sprung the names of A the two grout Suites liordering on the Pacific Ocean then? clings nn odor of mystery that renders a study of the imltject peculiarly interesting. In cither case all that is jtowtively known is the work in which it first appeared in print, but lx'yond that all is mystery; and this per plexing uncertainty has given rise to many theories, in genious and otherwise, in regard to which it may be said that while each jtossesses an element of possibility, more pnxifH can le brought forward to disprove them than to blister them up. The word "California" was first printed in a romance issue! in Neville in 1510, and entitled " The Sergas of KHplandiaii, the Son of Aniadis of Gaul." This was three years prior to tho discovery of the Pacific by Balboa, and nt 11 time when it was tho universal belief that the great continent which Columbus had discovered, and the Cnbotrt, (Vrtcreal ami others had partially explored, was tho Indies, or at least a great southeast and hitherto un known extension of tho continent of Asia, about which geographers then knew so little. Hero, perhaps, would lie found the magnificent Cathay of Marco Polo and the wonderful island of Cipango. Imagination peopled it with nations of strange civilizations, tilled it with precious metals and jewels in profusion, gave to it tho fabulous Fountain of Youth, and invested it with every desirable future that could lie conceived necessary to make of it an earthly realization of Heaven, even to giving into its keeping the Terrestrial Paradise from which the great prngeuitora of mankind had been driven in disgrace TW ideas were seized umn by the author of the mumuoe and emMied in the "Sergas," and the result was that his work Nvame immensely popular, and was universally read in Spain for many years afterwards. In this wonderful look occurs the following passage- M. lT71I,r. ' ,,ro,"iW', in -"U. from it. V of Siw. lhl he u .bout to undertake the conquest of Mmta, on the South Sea, M the IWfc waH 2 kI Ut he had motion of "au island of Amazon f' Wndin and gold, lv ng tTda W n,m Colima." Ten year, later .iT country miM ,;x though upon the llnl cv4ot,v v V '7"L Here lr :ez and said: "Cortez, that he might no longer be a spectator of such miseries, went on further discoveries, and landed in California, which is a bay." Here we find the first specific application of the title, evidently to some port on the peninsula visited by the great ConquioiUJor; and gradually this name became associated with the entire country claimed by Spain northwest of Mexico, as well as the gulf lying between them. Still later, when more was known of the coast, that portion lying east of the great Colorado, and north of the mouth of the Gila River, was designated as Alta California; and that is the land which the United States conquered from Mexico in 1846, which was invaded by a vast army of gold hunters in 1849, and which in 1850 was admitted into the great sisterhood of States under the name of California. Many efforts have been made to trace the etymology of the word, and some historians have advocated theories far more ingenious than plausible. One of them advances it as his opinion that the word is derived from the Latin rutix fomax, which being translated into English becomes " a hot f urnace," and that it was manufactured to order by the priests who first planted the Cross of Christ upon the burning sands of Lower California. That the title is peculiarly appropriate, any one who has traversed the wild wastes of sage brush and cactus beneath the scorch ing rnys of a noonday sun will freely admit, but beyond this it can have no support, since the name appeared in the old romance in its entirety nearly two centuries be fore the Jesuits invaded the peninsula. There is also an unpleasant air of pedantry attached to it, which is of itself n sufficient rensou for discarding it; names are seldom manufactured in such a cold-blooded classical manner. Another thinks that Calida fornalla may be considered the origiual words from which the title was evolved; but this, besides being like the other several centuries too late, seems to depend simply upon the euphony of sound, and resembles too closely the idea of the Irish immigrant, who supposed that Oregou was named in honor of hia great ancestors, the O'Regans. It has generally come to be admitted that the word has no etymology, and that it emanated solely from the brain of the romancer of Seville. Though a word of more modern manufacture, fully as much mystery surrounds the origin of "Oregon" as we have found to attend the birth of " California." The theory most generally accepted is thus set forth by Bishop Blanchet in a letter recently published in the Orcgonian: JtlfUtthan ('BUM. l .... . . . . . 1.1 . .,, jgp,,,,,, m u,, wm bj which rwad4 came im el ,0T"10,, of Britain, after the peace, left Boston June 8, lit, crowd " D,,nwt the Pacific, and returned October. 1768. In relation to hU "., which ,,, vMifiiM in ,4 and bluhed j he i, the first who make uiwur the w.ml"n , m .... .. i. . -,,.. . , " "". xiie origin oi inat vara na nerer u Bilho. f V COa,,,y Tbe fin,t r,,holio nnionarii-Father Demon, now rri. i , r ,,unna. ther Blanchet, now Bishop of Oregon uij- " V m Th0y twwW ,1,roah 5t for tTom "0Ulh WW " ' Tisitin" M" numerous tribes ot Ore- " H aHhlllirtnn T..--;. j ..... . V imr.;., -- i auo urmn poase.iona. But in aU their tstiu been diwrnTZi k i , I?. PP thnt what eoailX not 09 fon-,d in 0nm trr CTiila. .hi b "op Blanchet in BoiiTia, when he risited Uiatoo MEX,lmU,aim' "Oregon." in hi. opinion. f Jih', T.in ,h 8Pul worforeja (ear), and came from the wjaa uomara ear), or it it probable that the Spaniard",