Topic: Terms from The Communist Manifesto

160 years ago today (give or take a week) a 23 page, green-bound booklet was published in London. The tract was originally written (and published) in German; two years later, the first of what would be many English translations followed; and, since 1848, The Communist Manifesto has been translated into more than 100 different languages.

The publication of Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx's Manifesto—which begins "A spectre is haunting Europe; the spectre of communism"—coincided with the wave of revolutions that began sweeping Europe that spring. The turmoil that rocked France, Hungary, the Hapsburg Empire, the Italian and German states, and Greater Poland inspired historian Alexis de Tocqueville to later recall "those who had nothing united in common envy; and those who had anything united in common terror."

And what linguistic offerings can we recall from that era? Marx and Engels aren't credited with any word coinages in the Manifesto, but 1848 did see the first print appearance of the terms property right, industrial revolution, and the last straw. And without a doubt, the writings of Marx and Engels helped popularize proletariat, the label for the class of industrial workers who lack their own means of production and hence sell their labor to live.

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