Mono
Mono is the name of a county on the eastern border of the state, and of the lake near the eastern base of the Sierra Nevada. This lake is fourteen miles long and nine miles wide, and is peculiar in having no outlet, its waters being strongly saline and alkaline. It lies 6730 feet above sea-level and is almost completely destitute of animal life.
This name, corrupted from Monache, the name of the Indians of this region, through its resemblance to the Spanish word mono (monkey), has been the cause of considerable confusion, and of a number of extravagant theories, such as the supposed existence of monkeys in that country, or the resemblance of the natives to those animals, but the similarity between the two words is regarded by ethnologists as purely accidental. The meaning is obscure, but it is said that the name was applied to some Shoshonean tribes of southeastern California by their neighbors on the west.