[bluenose69]

In their paper (1), the authors state that R is to relate to S, but also to, in their words, "part to celebrate our own efforts". (Note their first names!). It's a great paper, by the way.

1. Ihaka, Ross, and Robert Gentleman. “R: A Language for Data Analysis and Graphics.” Journal of Computational & Graphical Statistics 5, no. 3 (1996): 299–314.

[madcaptenor]

I haven’t actually read it! I had assumed that they named it R and just left other people to notice that their names started with R, but no such false modesty for them.