Spartacist

noun

a member of a group of German radical socialists formed in 1916 and in 1919 becoming the German Communist Party, led by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg

Word Origin for Spartacist

C20: from the pen name Spartacus adopted by Karl Liebknecht

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Examples from the Web for spartacist

Historical Examples of spartacist

How many combinations does that give in which to find the perfect expression of a Spartacist commandant of a Hohenzollern castle.
The New Germany
George Young
The handsomest and most intelligent man I've met in Germany was a Spartacist, a film actor by profession.
The New Germany
George Young

Word Origin and History for spartacist

Spartacist

"German Bolshevik of November 1918 uprising," 1919, from German Spartakist, from Spartacus (d.71 B.C.E.), Thracian leader of Roman Servile War (73-71 B.C.E.), the name adopted 1916 as a pseudonym by Karl Liebknecht in his political tracts, and extended to the socialist revolutionary group he founded with Rosa Luxemburg and Franz Mehring.