Pull requests took their name from the git request-pull script (which actually predates Github by a couple years): https://github.com/git/git/commit/ab421d2c788

Pull requests took their name from the git request-pull script (which actually predates Github by a couple years): https://github.com/git/git/commit/ab421d2c7886341c246544bc8dea43c66a44d909 https://github.com/git/git/commit/ab421d2c7886341c246544bc8d... It is called a pull request because you are asking someone to do a `git pull` from your branch.