<P> The first anchorage was established at a small inlet on the north - east end of the peninsula (later filled: now lower Market Street), and the small settlement that grew up nearby was named Yerba Buena, after the herb of the same name that grew in abundance there . The original plaza of the Spanish settlement remains as Portsmouth Square . Today's city took its name from the mission, and Yerba Buena became the name of a San Francisco neighborhood now known as South of Market . The Moscone Center and Yerba Buena Gardens are in the Yerba Buena area . In addition, the name Yerba Buena was applied to the former Goat Island in the middle of San Francisco Bay, adjacent to Treasure Island . </P> <P> San Francisco became part of the United States with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 . </P> <P> European visitors to the San Francisco Bay Area were preceded at least 8,000 years earlier by Native Americans . According to one anthropologist, the indigenous name for San Francisco was Ahwaste, meaning, "place at the bay". Linguistic and paleontological evidence is unclear as to whether the earliest inhabitants of the area now known as San Francisco were the ancestors of the Ohlone population encountered by the Spanish in the late 18th century . The cultural unit, Ohlone, to which the San Francisco natives belonged did not recognize the city or county boundaries imposed later by Americans, and were part of a contiguous set of bands that lived from south of the Golden Gate to San José . </P> <P> When the Spanish arrived, they found the area inhabited by the Yelamu tribe, which belongs to a linguistic grouping later called the Ohlone . The Ohlone speakers are distinct from Pomo speakers north of the San Francisco Bay, and are part of the Miwok group of languages . Their traditional territory stretched from Big Sur to the San Francisco Bay, although their trading area was much larger . Miwok - speaking Indians also lived in Yosemite, and Ohlone - speakers intermarried with Chumash and Pomo speakers as well . </P>

Where does the name san francisco come from