The law is named after the American linguist George Kingsley Zipf (1902--1950), who first proposed it (Zipf 1935,1949), though the French stenographer Jean-Baptiste Estoup (1868--1950) appears to have noticed the regularity before Zipf.
The law is named after the American linguist George Kingsley Zipf (1902--1950), who popularized it and sought to explain it (Zipf 1935,1949), though he did not claim to have originated it. The French stenographer Jean-Baptiste Estoup (1868--1950) appears to have noticed the regularity before Zipf.