Regular reader MK sent this one in (thanks!) ... I'm not sure whether we've mentioned this little tidbit (taken from a lengthy (and somewhat old) review at Benzene 4) before, but it sounds vaguely familiar in my pre-caffeinated state:

The name "Golden Gate" is indeed a translation from a foreign language, but not from Spanish. (The Spanish settlers weren't maritime-minded, remember.) Rather, it comes from classical Greek. John C Fremont rhapsodically deemed the strait Chrysopylae, in conscious imitation of Byzantium's Chrysoceras, aka "Golden Horn".